AcademicArticleSCO_84963839172

abstract

• © 1996-2012 IEEE. Chemical sensors are used mainly for odor discrimination and odor concentration monitoring. A recent development is the insertion of chemical sensors in mobile robots to track odor traces as well as to detect and declare odor sources. A major drawback of a chemical sensor for perceiving odors is the time it needs to recover its original state once saturated. Furthermore, when the source behaves as a constant gas leak, the presence of the odor is always increasing in the environment, saturating the sensors. The integration of chemical sensors into real-time mobile applications requires the smell perception system to desaturate them faster. This paper proposed an artificial nostril, inspired by nature, including the design of chambers to desaturate the sensors and the mathematical model. The main contribution is the implementation of the biologically inspired process of 'ventilation' that bears in mind the sensor model as a cyclic behavior that includes three stages named inhalation, sampling, and exhalation. This model guided the design of the smelling device.