Exhaled breath analysis using an e-nose is a groundbreaking tool for exhaled volatile organic compound (VOC) analysis, which has already shown its applicability in several respiratory and systemic diseases. It is still unclear whether food intake can be considered a confounder when analyzing the VOC-profile. We aimed to assess whether an e-nose can discriminate exhaled breath before and after predefined food intake at different time periods. We enrolled 28 healthy non-smoking adults and collected their exhaled breath as follows: (a) before food intake, (b) within 5 min after food consumption, (c) within 1 h after eating, and (d) within 2 h after eating. Exhaled breath was collected by a formerly validated method and analyzed by an e-nose (Cyranose 320). By principal component analysis, significant variations in the exhaled VOC-profile were shown for principal component 1 (capturing 63.4% of total variance) when comparing baseline vs. 5 min and vs. 1 h after food intake (both p < 0.05). No significance was shown in the comparison between baseline and 2 h after food intake. Therefore, the exhaled VOC-profile seems to be influenced by very recent food intake. Interestingly, two hours might be sufficient to avoid food induced alterations of exhaled VOC-spectrum when sampling for research protocols.
Keywords: breath analysis; breathomics; e-nose; electronic nose; volatile organic compounds.