E-Nose can smell fine Whiskeys and detect cheats

So you’re at a bar with friends and order a neat whiskey. To impress them, you bring the glass to your nose to sniff and make some vague remarks about the woody aroma before taking a sip. While your attempts to pretend you know anything about whiskey are pretty weak (you can’t tell a bourbon from a White Claw), there’s hope: Recent Researchers created an “electronic nose” that can distinguish different whiskeys.

A team of scientists from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) recently published a paper in the journal IEEE sensor about the device, dubbed the “NOS.E,” which they claim can distinguish between different origins, brands and styles of a whiskey just by “smelling” it. The electronic nose was created to help detect fraudulent junk whiskeys marketed as premium spirits.

“Until now, spotting the differences between whiskeys required a trained whiskey connoisseur who could still confuse or analyze complex and time consuming chemistry by scientists. study in the laboratory,” said Steven Su, an associate professor at UTS and study leader. the study’s authors, said in a press release. “So a quick, easy-to-use, real-time whiskey assessment to determine quality and spot any forgery or fraud can be very beneficial for both wholesalers and retailers. high-end buyers.”

Unfortunately, NOS.E doesn’t look like the monstrous nose you would pick up a glass of whiskey. Instead, alcohol is poured into a small vial on the device. The liquid’s vapor is then injected into a gas sensor connected to a computer that uses a trained machine learning algorithm to identify different whiskeys.

The team was able to use the device to identify three blended malts and three single malt scotch whiskeys. According to the study, the electronic nose produced 100% accuracy for detecting whiskey regions, 96.15% for its brand name and 92.41% for its style – a much higher accuracy. a lot more than most people’s noses.

It may sound a bit silly, but this device can be extremely valuable to high-end winemakers, dealers, and collectors. Scammers often make fake whiskey bottles that are sought after. In fact, a 2018 study found that up to a third of all bottles of rare single malt scotch whiskey are fake – which can be seriously recognized once you’ve spent $1,000. dollars to $5,000 for a bottle. Therefore, a device that can be faked from the real thing can save collectors and manufacturers a lot of money.

For now, however, NOS.E is still just a prototype. However, the researchers believe that the electronic nose has a lot of potential applications outside of the alcohol industry including detecting illegal animal parts on the black market, identifying fake perfumes and even detect disease in humans.