Measurement of Volatile Fatty Acids in Silage through Odors with Nanomechanical Sensors
Kosuke Minami,
Hisami Kobayashi,
Masaaki Matoba,
Yuko Kamiya,
Subrata Maji,
Takahiro Nemoto,
Masanori Tohno,
Ryoh Nakakubo,
Genki Yoshikawa
Affiliations
Kosuke Minami
Center for Functional Sensor & Actuator (CFSN), Research Center for Functional Materials, National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba 305-0044, Ibaraki, Japan
Hisami Kobayashi
Institute of Livestock and Grassland Science, National Agriculture and Food Research Organization (NARO), 768 Senbonmatsu, Nasushiobara 329-2793, Tochigi, Japan
Masaaki Matoba
Center for Functional Sensor & Actuator (CFSN), Research Center for Functional Materials, National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba 305-0044, Ibaraki, Japan
Yuko Kamiya
Institute of Livestock and Grassland Science, National Agriculture and Food Research Organization (NARO), 768 Senbonmatsu, Nasushiobara 329-2793, Tochigi, Japan
Subrata Maji
Center for Functional Sensor & Actuator (CFSN), Research Center for Functional Materials, National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba 305-0044, Ibaraki, Japan
Takahiro Nemoto
Center for Functional Sensor & Actuator (CFSN), Research Center for Functional Materials, National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba 305-0044, Ibaraki, Japan
Masanori Tohno
Institute of Livestock and Grassland Science, National Agriculture and Food Research Organization (NARO), 768 Senbonmatsu, Nasushiobara 329-2793, Tochigi, Japan
Ryoh Nakakubo
Institute of Livestock and Grassland Science, National Agriculture and Food Research Organization (NARO), 2 Ikenodai, Tsukuba 305-0901, Ibaraki, Japan
Genki Yoshikawa
Center for Functional Sensor & Actuator (CFSN), Research Center for Functional Materials, National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), 1-1 Namiki, Tsukuba 305-0044, Ibaraki, Japan
The measurement of volatile fatty acids (VFAs) is of great importance in the fields of food and agriculture. There are various methods to measure VFAs, but most methods require specific equipment, making on-site measurements difficult. In this work, we demonstrate the measurements of VFAs in a model sample, silage, through its vapor using an array of nanomechanical sensors—Membrane-type Surface stress Sensors (MSS). Focusing on relatively slow desorption behaviors of VFAs predicted with the sorption kinetics of nanomechanical sensing and the dissociation nature of VFAs, the VFAs can be efficiently measured by using features extracted from the decay curves of the sensing response, resulting in sufficient discrimination of the silage samples. Since the present sensing system does not require expensive, bulky setup and pre-treatment of samples, it has a great potential for practical applications including on-site measurements.
