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IEEE SENSORS JOURNAL, VOL. 10, NO. 1, JANUARY 2010

Breath Analyzer for Alcolocks and Screening Devices

Bertil Hk, Hkan Pettersson, Annika Kaisdotter Andersson, Sjoerd Haasl, Member, IEEE, and Per kerlund
AbstractAlcolocks and alcohol screening devices are becoming commonplace, and their use is expected to grow rapidly with cost reduction and improved usability. A new breath analyzer prototype is demonstrated, with the prospects of eliminating the mouthpiece, reducing expiration time and volume, improving long-term stability, and reducing life cycle cost. Simultaneous CO2 measurements compensate for the sample dilution and unsaturated expiration. Infrared transmission spectroscopy is used for both the alcohol and CO2 measurement, yet the entire system is contained within a small handheld unit. Experimental results are reported on the device sensitivity, linearity, resolution, and inuence from varying measuring distance. The correlation between early and full-time sampling was established in 60 subjects. Basic concept verication was obtained, whereas resolution and selectivity still needs to be improved. Further improvements are expected by system optimization and integration. Index TermsAutomotive safety, breath alcohol concentration, breath analysis, optical transducers.

I. INTRODUCTION

LCOLOCKS are becoming commonplace, not only for convicts of drunk driving, but also for professional drivers as a tool for quality assurance of transport services. In Sweden alone, the number of users exceeds 75 000, and across Europe, the total number is rapidly growing. A European industrial standard, EN 50136-2 [1], concerning alcolocks for general purpose applications was adopted in 2007. The standard [1] is stating requirements of, e.g., accuracy ( 0.03 mg/L or 15% whichever is higher), and selectivity (discriminate ethyl alcohol from 13 substances, including acetone, isopropanol, methanol). In 2008, Volvo launched AlcoGuard, the rst vehicle-integrated alcolock in private cars. The Swedish police force performs more than 2 million breath alcohol tests per year, out of which approximately 15 000 drivers are convicted for drunk driving beyond the legal breath alcohol concentration limit of 0.1 mg/L. The routine is

a two-step procedure in which the rst step is performed by means of handheld alcometers. The second step is performed with more advanced instruments providing output which can be used as judicial evidence. Other potential screening applications of breath analysis include passage control, and diagnostics in primary and preventive health care. Today, the use of alcometers in these applications is rare, mainly due to limitations of usability. The mandatory mouthpiece of present breath analyzers is a limiting obstacle both with respect to throughput and to running cost. The dominating sensor technology in present alcolocks and screening devices is based on catalytic combustion, either in fuel cells or in heated metal oxide mixtures. Reliability and longterm stability are issues with both sensor types, due to degradation and possible contamination of the catalytic surfaces. The devices require periodic recalibration and occasional replacement of degraded sensor elements. In this paper, a new system solution for high throughput breath analysis is presented. The system is sampling in freely expired air without a mouthpiece [2], and makes use of infrared transmission spectroscopy as sensing principle. The basic principle and implementation of the breath analyzer will be described, along with experimental test results. The potential impact of the new system and suggestions for further development will be discussed. II. BASIC MEASUREMENT PRINCIPLE Breath sampling without the use of a mouthpiece involves one basic difference from conventional techniques. Since the sample is mixed with ambient air, it is necessary to correct the breath alcohol concentration for the dilution. Our approach to this problem is simultaneous measurement of carbon dioxide CO at the same sampling point as for alcohol. As a rst approximation, we may neglect the CO concentration of ambient , which, air in comparison to its alveolar concentration, again as a rst approximation, may be considered to be constant at 4.8 kPa [3]. With these approximations, the internal breath can be deteralcohol (ethanol, EtOH) concentration mined from external measurements using the simple equation (1) The mixing ratio will typically range from 20 to 60% at a sampling point 515 cm from the mouth of a test person performing a forced expiration. The rationale of the basic physiological assumptions and approximations is investigated and reported elsewhere [4]. The mixing ratio can alternatively be determined by measurements of water vapor concentration [5], or temperature. The mucous tissue of the airways is normally wet, resulting in a water vapor concentration of expiratory air close to saturation at the

Manuscript received November 10, 2008; revised January 08, 2009; accepted February 07, 2009. Current version published December 09, 2009. This work was supported in part by the national Swedish research program Intelligent Vehicle Safety System, IVSS. The associate editor coordinating the review of this manuscript and approving it for publication was Prof. Cristina Davis. B. Hk and P. kerlund are with Hk Instrument AB, Flottiljgatan 49, SE-721 31 Vsters, Sweden (e-mail: bertil@hokinstrument.se; per@hokinstrument.se). H. Pettersson is with Autoliv Development AB, SE-447 83 Vrgrda, Sweden (e-mail: hakan.pettersson@autoliv.com). A. Kaisdotter Andersson is with Hk Instrument AB, Flottiljgatan 49, SE-721 31 Vsters, Sweden, and also with the School of Innovation, Design, and Engineering, Mlardalen University, Vsters, Sweden (e-mail: annika@hokinstrument.se). S. Haasl is with Imego, Arvid Hedvalls Backe 4, Box 53071, SE-400 14 Gothenburg, Sweden (e-mail: sjoerd.haasl@imego.com). Digital Object Identier 10.1109/JSEN.2009.2035204

1530-437X/$26.00 2009 IEEE

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Fig. 2. High-resolution infrared absorption spectra of ethanol and CO . Absorbance data are provided in (ppm) m and processed from [8]. Fig. 1. Expirogram of ethanol, CO and H O performed by a healthy subject. The recording was performed with a modied Evidenzer instrument (Nanopuls AB, Sweden). More details are provided in [4].

prevailing body temperature. The choice of H O concentration or temperature for the determination of mixing ratio could be advantageous compared to CO with respect to smaller physiological variation. On the other hand, the background variation of H O is much larger than for CO , especially at outdoor operation. Similarly, the background temperature can have large variations, and even be at the same temperature as the expired air. An expirogram is a graphical representation of gas concentrations against time during an expiration. Fig. 1 shows a typical expirogram during forced expiration to residual volume of a healthy adult person, recorded with reference equipment and with mouthpiece (Evidenzer, Nanopuls AB, Sweden). The ethanol and H O concentrations are observed to rise more rapidly in the initial phase than CO . This is due to the fact that CO has low solubility in the mucous tissue of the upper airways [6]. Another striking feature of the expirogram in Fig. 1 is that the H O curve is almost at during the nal phase, whereas both the CO and ethanol concentrations are steadily increasing with time. In order to avoid unsaturated expiration, large sample volumes over extended time are required by state-of-the-art alcometers. Since ethanol and CO exhibit similar slope pattern of unsaturation, compensation can be provided by calculating the ratio EtOH/CO . Infrared (IR) transmission spectroscopy provides the unique possibility of combining high sensitivity, selectivity and reliability at a moderate cost. Basically, a broadband IR source, such as a blackbody radiator, illuminates a measurement cell containing the gas sample to be analyzed. IR detectors with optical band-pass lters located along the optical path, allow determination of the ethanol and CO concentration. The absorbance of the radiation at a certain distance L from the source is determined by Beer-Lamberts law [7] (2) where is the molar absorption coefcient, and C the molar concentration. Fig. 2 shows high resolution IR spectra of

ethanol and CO . It is observed that CO has a strong absorption band at approximately 4.3 m, whereas ethanol absorbs strongly at 3.33.5 m. There is no cross absorption between CO and ethanol, within these wavelength regions [8]. The absorption peaks are mainly resulting from molecular vibrations. The ethanol absorption band originates from C-H stretch vibrations [7], and the double peak structure is explained by the two asymmetrically positioned carbon atoms within the molecule. Although C-H bonds occur in almost all organic molecules, specic absorbance signatures allow differentiation among substances. In principle, it is possible to both identify and quantify the presence of most organic substances within a breath sample by analyzing the ne structure of the absorption band at 3.33.5 m. To meet the selectivity requirements of EN 50436-1 [1], it is adequate to separate the signal into at least two sub-bands within the range 3.33.5 m. With the use of (2), the requirements on resolution [1], and the absorbances of Fig. 2, it is possible to estimate the optical path L required for measurements of ethanol and CO , respectively. The result is that for ethanol, the optical path needs to be of the order of decimeters, whereas only millimeters are required for CO due to higher concentration and absorbance. III. IMPLEMENTATION The requirement of decimeters of optical path is seemingly incompatible with the compact size of a handheld unit. However, in the 1940s, White [9] demonstrated a general solution to this problem, which Martin [10] has developed into a concept for mass production with the use of polymer technology. The principle of Martins device is illustrated in Fig. 3. The operational principle of the optical module is illustrated in Fig. 3. The diverging beam from the IR source is reected and focused several times from elliptical surfaces to other reecting surfaces, then nally focused on the IR detector. The reecting surfaces are typically thin gold lms with reectance 0.99 for wavelengths over 2 m [11]. The module used in the present prototype exhibits an optical path of 210 mm, has an inner volume of 5 cm , and is provided with inlet and outlet openings for passive reception and ventilation of the breath sample. The module is heated to 40 C to avoid condensation of water droplets.

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IEEE SENSORS JOURNAL, VOL. 10, NO. 1, JANUARY 2010

Fig. 5. Prototype of the breath analyzer (Design and photo: Manoo Eibpoosh, Imego). Fig. 3. Optical gas sensor module adapted for high volume production, according to Martin [10]. By multiple reections, a long optical path at large aperture is combined with small physical size. This type of element is being used in several products from SenseAir AB, Sweden.

Fig. 4. Block diagram of the breath analyzer.

Fig. 4 shows a block diagram of the breath analyzer prototype. A programmable system-on chip (Cypress PSoC 29566) is used for controlling the measurement sequences, involving pulse generation for the IR source, dening time windows for signal detection, offset correction, ltering, analog to digital conversion, and execution of signal algorithms. Commercially available components were used in the prototype: IR source and detectors from Heimann Sensors GmbH, Germany, including interference narrow band-pass lters. The IR detectors are thermopiles generating a signal voltage in the V range, and the signals are amplied by low-noise preampliers. At normal operation, the PSoC generates one data le identiable by real time clocking of each breath test, and including the full time sequence of signals from the IR detectors. After calibration of the system, the calibration parameters for the individual sensor are set, i.e., the gain factor of each IR channel. Other parameters are concerned with the physiological constants, e.g., according to (1), correction of nonlinearity according to Beer-Lambert law (2), and settings for the signal algorithm and heat control.

The prototype also includes a communication processor (Cypress 24894) for USB connection to a computer (not shown in Fig. 4). A memory is used for intermittent storage of data which can be downloaded to a computer upon request. During active operation, the unit has a power consumption of 7 W, and makes use of an external 12 V DC supply. In this prototype a display facilitates the users interaction with the device. Fig. 5 shows the prototype in normal operational mode. The breath sample is delivered as a short (23 s) expiration by the test person at a distance of 515 cm from the device. The inlet is indicated by a circular hole grid. A lid covering the inlet slides down to activate the device, as shown in Fig. 5. The physical mm. size of the prototype is A simplied ow chart of the breath analyzer is shown in Fig. 6. When the unit is turned on, it performs an initialization consisting of a self test of the electronics and heating of the optical module. It then waits for the signals to stabilize and requests the user to blow. The CO and ethanol concentrations are logged until enough data is collected. If the measurement is deemed valid, the actual breath alcohol concentration is calculated. If the concentration does not exceed the set limit, the engine is unlocked. IV. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS In this section, results from analysis of expirograms, bench testing, calibration, model experiments, and in vivo recordings of the breath analyzer prototype will be presented. A primary objective was to nd out whether basic requirements set by the application areas were fullled or not. Reference [1] acted as guideline for these requirements. A total of 120 expirograms as in Fig. 1 was taken from 60 volunteers. The EtOH/CO ratio after two seconds was compared to the ratio at the end of expiration, which had been extended to residual volume in all cases. The result shown in Fig. 7 indicates . a strong correlation, Fig. 8 shows an oscilloscope recording of the drive signal used for excitation of the IR source (top curve), and the corresponding response of the IR detector (lower curve), after preamplication. The excitation pulses have a duration of approxi-

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Fig. 8. Drive pulses to the IR source (top curve) and the preamplier signal (lower curve).

Fig. 6. Simplied ow chart of the breath alcohol unit.

Fig. 9. Calibration of the prototype, using controlled injections of ethanol and CO . Vertical scale is A/D bits (0.105 V/bit). Fig. 7. Strong correlation (r0 = :98 between the ethanol/CO ratio after two ) seconds of expiration and the corresponding ratio at the end of expiration to residual volume, was observed. A total of 120 expirograms as in Fig. 1 from 60 subjects were included.

mately 100 ms, and a repetition rate of 2 Hz. The preamplier includes a low-pass lter with corner frequency of approximately 120 Hz. The input noise is approximately 0.3 V over 1-Hz bandwidth. The A/D converter takes one signal sample immediately prior to the onset of the pulse, and another at the nal stage of the pulse. The result of a calibration procedure, in which the prototype has been subjected to controlled variation of ethanol and CO concentration, is shown in Fig. 9. The recorded signals are the difference between the onset and nal stage of excitation of the respective IR detectors. The insets of Fig. 9 provide quantitative data of sensitivity, absorbance, noise and resolution. The ethanol channel is approximately linear within the recorded concentration range, whereas the CO signal exhibits a notable sub-linear response in accordance with Beer-Lamberts law. Fig. 10 shows the result of a model experiment in which the prototype was subjected to simulated breath samples at varying positions from the inlet. The gas mixture for the articial source was 5% CO in nitrogen delivered from a gas bottle via a pressure reducing valve, and a ow controller. A diffusing orice

Fig. 10. Measurements of the air mixing ratio as a function of axial and lateral distance, using an experimental gas ow generator.

with 30-mm diameter was simulating a mouth opening. The CO signal was recorded for each simulated breath sample in terms of the mixing ratio [recorded CO concentration/original CO concentration (5 kPa)]. From Fig. 10, it can be observed that the mixing ratio declines almost linearly with increased axial distance. The recording of lateral misalignment was made at an axial distance of 100 mm, and the sensitivity to misalignment is initially modest but becomes excessive at two orice diameters (60 mm).

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IEEE SENSORS JOURNAL, VOL. 10, NO. 1, JANUARY 2010

Fig. 11. Recording of breath signals from an intoxicated test person. Vertical scale is A/D bits (0.105 V/bit).

Fig. 12. Measurements of breath alcohol concentration with the prototype compared to a reference instrument (Evidenzer, Nanopuls AB, Sweden).

Fig. 11 shows a recording of two breath samples from a moderately intoxicated test person. At the occasion, the breath alcohol concentration was 0.28 mg/L according to a reference instrument (Evidenzer, Nanopuls, Sweden). The insets of Fig. 11 show the actual ethanol and CO signal magnitudes, and the air mixing ratios. After correction for the mixing ratios of the two breath samples, the calculated breath alcohol concentrations were 0.36 and 0.34 mg/L, respectively, thus somewhat overestimating the true value. From Fig. 11, it can be observed that the noise of the ethanol signal includes not only a stationary component existing throughout the recording, but also one strong component occurring at the onset of each breath, and also during venting of the second breath (at approximately 300320 seconds). Fig. 12 shows 45 calculated breath alcohol concentration values from the prototype corrected for sample dilution compared to the reference instrument, the Evidenzer. A standard deviation of approximately 0.05 mg/L is found, as expected from the combination of the noise and an average dilution factor of 0.6. V. DISCUSSION In this paper, the implementation of a handheld breath analyzer based on IR sensor technology is demonstrated along with its performance. The use of a proprietary optical module from SenseAir AB is one key to the solution, another is the

human/machine interface, together with several engineering solutions of the system design. The described implementation is modular in the sense that several parts of the design may be replaced, modied or deleted without adversely affecting the remaining system. For example, the passive uidics used in the present prototype could easily be upgraded in performance by adding active pumping elements. Response and recovery times would be signicantly reduced at the expense of somewhat increased power consumption. The strong correlation between the EtOH/CO ratios after two seconds compared to their nal values indicated in Fig. 7, and further elaborated results [4], provides experimental evidence that breath sampling could be terminated much earlier than in state of the art breath analyzers. The EtOH/CO ratio thus acts as a compensation for unsaturated readings. It is expected to facilitate breath analysis in subjects with impaired breathing capacity, and will also make manipulation by shallow breathing more difcult. The performance of the prototype is adequate to alcolock and screening applications in most respects, although work towards improvements is underway. In countries with a low concentration limit, e.g., Sweden, it would be desirable to increase the resolution-bandwidth product with a factor of 35. The system was designed with the objective of maintenancefree operation for 15 years. Fulllment of this objective remains to be evaluated. Selectivity is a remaining issue for further discussion. The requirements dened by EN 50436-2 [1], which is a modied list of substances relevant for evidential instruments [12], are by no means adapted to specic applications. The discrimination of acetone and other endogenic substances is probably required in most applications. The thesis of Laakso [13] includes a comprehensive list of substances and their signicance to breath analyzers. The list needs to be balanced against rate of occurrence in the actual application, which in case of evidential breath testing [14] and, thus, also in alcolocks, may be extremely low. The prototype described in this paper will be the subject of further development towards industrialization and vehicle integration. High priority will be attributed to adaptation for high volume production, and procedures for high throughput device testing. In the eld of automotive safety, research efforts towards passive detection of breath alcohol in vehicles are underway. We believe that the basic system concept described in this paper offers an interesting route towards this objective. However, to fulll the criteria of an entirely passive device, further development of the technology is needed. Both with alcolocks and passive breath alcohol detection, the human/machine interaction as well as ethical issues must be considered. ACKNOWLEDGMENT The authors would like to thank all members of the project team, and advisors, for their contributions: G. Andersson, Imego; L. Andersson, Elpako; T. Biding, The Swedish Road Administration; B. Bjerre, The Swedish Road Administration; A. Blckert, Hk Instrument; S. Boman, AB Volvo; M.

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Eibpoosh, Imego; J. Enerud, SenseAir; H. Graan, Autoliv Electronics; J.-F. Grnvall, Volvo Cars; A. Haggrd, The Swedish Road Administration; G. Hedenstierna, Uppsala University; P. Holmberg, Autoliv Electronics; C. Jonasson, Imego; L. Jakobsson, The Swedish Road Administration; P. Johannisson, Imego; T. Jonsson, MHF; J. Jrvegrd, Hk Instrument; A. Lie, The Swedish Road Administration; H. Ljung, Volvo Cars; H. Martin, SenseAir; L. Nylund, SenseAir; J. Olsson, Autoliv; P. Pettersson, AB Volvo; T. Pettersson, Imego; C. Roth, AB Volvo; H. Rdjegrd, SenseAir; T. Sandstrm, Ume University; M. Soininen, Volvo Cars; J. Steggo, Hk Instrument; C. Tingvall, The Swedish Road Administration; P. Zyrianov, SenseAir.

Bertil Hk was born in 1947 and received the Ph.D. degree in electronics from Uppsala University, Sweden, in 1975. After employments at Siemens-Elema and ASEA, he founded Hk Instrument AB in 1986, and has been the CEO of the company since then. During 19842002, he served as Visiting Professor at Uppsala University. His research interests are mainly related to sensorics for health oriented applications.

REFERENCES
[1] Alcohol InterlocksTest Methods and Performance Requirements Part 2: Instruments Having a Mouthpiece and Measuring Breath Alcohol for General Preventive Use, European Industrial Standard EN 50436-2: CENELEC BTTF 116-2, 2007. [2] B. Hk, H. Pettersson, and G. Andersson, Contactless measurement of breath alcohol, in Proc. Micro Structure Workshop, Vsters, Sweden, 2006, p. 36-Ble. [3] A. Lumb, Carbon dioxide, in Nunns Applied Respiratory Physiology, 6th ed. Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Elsevier Butterworth Heinemann, 2005, ch. 10, pp. 148165. [4] A. Jonsson, B. Hk, L. Andersson, and G. Hedenstierna, Methodology investigation of expirograms for enabling contact free breath alcohol analysis, J. Breath Res., no. 3, 2009, 036002, DOI:10.1088/ 1752-7155/3/3/036002. [5] L. Lindberg, S. Brauer, P. Wollmer, A. W. Jones, and S.-G. Olsson, Breath alcohol concentration determined with a new analyser using free exhalation predicts almost precisely the arterial blood concentration, Forens. Sci. Int., vol. 168, pp. 200207, Sep. 2006. [6] M. P. Hlastala, The alcohol breath testA review, J. Appl. Physiol., vol. 84, no. 2, pp. 401408, Feb. 1998. [7] P. Atkins and J. de Paula, Atkins Physical Chemistry, 8th ed. Oxford, U.K.: Oxford Univ. Press, 2006, ch. 13, pp. 430480. [8] Public Database of Pacic Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), [Online]. Available: https://secure2.pnl.gov/nsd/nsd.nsf/Welcome [9] J. U. White, Long optical paths with large aperture, J. Opt. Soc. Amer., vol. 32, no. 5, pp. 285289, May 1942. [10] H. Martin, Gas Sensor, Swedish Patent SE 510549, Nov. 13, 1995. [11] S. Musikant, Mirrors, in Optical MaterialsAn Introduction to Selection and Application. New York: Marcel Dekker, 1985, ch. 9, p. 195. [12] International Industrial Standard for Breath Analyzers for Evidential Purposes, OIML R126-1, 1998. [13] O. Laakso, Breath Testing by Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy for Solvent Intoxication Diagnostics, Ph.D. dissertation, Dept. Anaesthesia and Intensive Care Med., Helsinki Univ., Helsinki, Finland, 2006. [14] A. W. Jones and L. Andersson, Determination of ethanol in breath for legal purposes using a 5-lter infrared analyzer: Studies on response to volatile interfering substances, J. Breath Res., vol. 2, no. 2, pp. 71527155, Jun. 2008.

Hkan Pettersson was born in 1951 and received the M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from Chalmers University of Technology in 1975 and the Licentiate Engineering degree in solid state electronics from Linkping University in 1985. He has worked for the National Defence Research Institute, Saab Military Aircraft, and the National Maritime Administration in Sweden. In 1996, he joined Autoliv Research where he is responsible for sensor research within corporate research.

Annika Kaisdotter Andersson was born in 1978. She received the B.Sc. degree in 2002 and the Tech. Lic. degree in 2006 in electronics from Mlardalen University, Vsters. She was an a Research Engineer (20022003), a Ph.D. Student (20032006), and a Lecturer/Director of Studies (20062007) at Mlardalen University. Since 2007, she has been with Hk Instrument, where she has continued her Ph.D. studies.

Sjoerd Haasl (M00) born in 1976. He received the M.Sc. degree with high honors in electrotechnical and mechanical engineering from the University of Leuven, Belgium, in 1999, and the Ph.D. degree in microsystem technology from the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden, in 2005. Since then, he has been a Research Scientist and Project Manager at IMEGO AB, Gothenburg, Sweden. His current research interests lie in the eld of microsystems.

Per kerlund was born in 1974. He received the M.Sc. degree in electronics from Mlardalen University, Vsters, in 1998. He was with Mlardalen University from 19981999 and has been with Hk Instrument since 1999.