E-Nose System to Detect E-Coli in Drinking Water of Udupi District

E-nose (Electronic nose), which is an array of chemical sensors, is widely used in food industry and pollution control. Nowadays e-nose technology has become powerful tool to evaluate the aroma compounds during the quality control process. This work is intended to detect biological water contaminants like coliform group of bacteria in drinking water. However, a number of limitations are associated with traditional methods of microbial detection. The water samples were collected from the River Swarna in Udupi district and analyzed for the presence of E-coli. An E-nose system is developed using embedded PIC micro controller to detect and quantify the microbial contaminants. The results of this analysis were compared with standard Multiple Test Tube Fermentation (MTTF) method, which indicates the Most Probable Number (MPN) for the bacterial density in drinking water. Keywords––E-nose, E-coli, PIC Micro Controller, Multiple Test Tube Fermentation (MTTF) method, Most Probable Number (MPN)