<p class="title">Scientists have developed an artificial nose that may help doctors identify cancerous tissue during surgery, and enable them to remove tumours with more precision.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Electrosurgical resection using devices such as an electric knife or diathermy blade is currently a widely used technique in neurosurgery.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When tissue is burned, tissue molecules are dispersed in the form of surgical smoke.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Researchers at Tampere University in Finland developed a method in where surgical smoke is fed into a new type of measuring system that can identify malignant tissue and distinguish it from healthy tissue.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"In current clinical practice, frozen section analysis is the gold standard for intraoperative tumour identification. In that method, a small sample of the tumour is given to a pathologist during surgery," said Ilkka Haapala from Tampere University.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The pathologist undertakes a microscopic analysis of the sample and phones the operating theatre to report the results.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"Our new method offers both a promising way to identify malignant tissue in real time and the ability to study several samples from different points of the tumour," Haapala said.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"The specific advantage of the equipment is that it can be connected to the instrumentation already present in neurosurgical operating theatres," Haapala said.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The technology, described in the Journal of Neurosurgery, is based on differential mobility spectrometry (DMS), wherein flue gas ions are fed into an electric field.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The distribution of ions in the electric field is tissue-specific, and the tissue can be identified on the basis of the resulting "odour fingerprint."</p>.<p class="bodytext">The study analysed 694 tissue samples collected from 28 brain tumours and control specimens.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The equipment used was developed specifically for the study. It consists of a machine learning system, which analyses the flue gas with DMS technology, and an electric knife, which is used to produce the flue gas from the tissues.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The system's classification accuracy was 83 per cent when all the samples were analysed. The accuracy improved in more restricted settings.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When comparing low malignancy tumours to control samples, the classification accuracy of the system was 94 per cent, reaching 97 per cent sensitivity and 90 per cent specificity. </p>
<p class="title">Scientists have developed an artificial nose that may help doctors identify cancerous tissue during surgery, and enable them to remove tumours with more precision.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Electrosurgical resection using devices such as an electric knife or diathermy blade is currently a widely used technique in neurosurgery.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When tissue is burned, tissue molecules are dispersed in the form of surgical smoke.</p>.<p class="bodytext">Researchers at Tampere University in Finland developed a method in where surgical smoke is fed into a new type of measuring system that can identify malignant tissue and distinguish it from healthy tissue.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"In current clinical practice, frozen section analysis is the gold standard for intraoperative tumour identification. In that method, a small sample of the tumour is given to a pathologist during surgery," said Ilkka Haapala from Tampere University.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The pathologist undertakes a microscopic analysis of the sample and phones the operating theatre to report the results.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"Our new method offers both a promising way to identify malignant tissue in real time and the ability to study several samples from different points of the tumour," Haapala said.</p>.<p class="bodytext">"The specific advantage of the equipment is that it can be connected to the instrumentation already present in neurosurgical operating theatres," Haapala said.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The technology, described in the Journal of Neurosurgery, is based on differential mobility spectrometry (DMS), wherein flue gas ions are fed into an electric field.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The distribution of ions in the electric field is tissue-specific, and the tissue can be identified on the basis of the resulting "odour fingerprint."</p>.<p class="bodytext">The study analysed 694 tissue samples collected from 28 brain tumours and control specimens.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The equipment used was developed specifically for the study. It consists of a machine learning system, which analyses the flue gas with DMS technology, and an electric knife, which is used to produce the flue gas from the tissues.</p>.<p class="bodytext">The system's classification accuracy was 83 per cent when all the samples were analysed. The accuracy improved in more restricted settings.</p>.<p class="bodytext">When comparing low malignancy tumours to control samples, the classification accuracy of the system was 94 per cent, reaching 97 per cent sensitivity and 90 per cent specificity. </p>