Stand-off chemical sensing is an important capability with applications in several domains including homeland security. Engineered devices for this task, popularly referred to as electronic noses, have limited capacity compared to the broad-spectrum abilities of the biological olfactory system. Therefore, we propose a hybrid bio-electronic solution that directly takes advantage of the rich repertoire of olfactory sensors and sophisticated neural computational framework available in an insect olfactory system. We show that select subsets of neurons in the locust (Schistocerca americana) brain were activated upon exposure to various explosive chemical species (such as DNT and TNT). Responses from an ensemble of neurons provided a unique, multivariate fingerprint that allowed discrimination of explosive vapors from non-explosive chemical species and from each other. Notably, target chemical recognition could be achieved within a few hundred milliseconds of exposure. In sum, our study provides the first demonstration of how biological olfactory systems (sensors and computations) can be hijacked to develop a cyborg chemical sensing approach.

隔离化学感测是一项重要功能，在包括国土安全在内的多个领域中都有应用。与生物嗅觉系统的广谱能力相比，用于此任务的工程设备通常被称为电子鼻。因此，我们提出了一种混合生物电子解决方案，可直接利用昆虫嗅觉系统中丰富的嗅觉传感器库和复杂的神经计算框架。我们表明刺槐（Schistocerca americana接触各种爆炸性化学物质（例如DNT和TNT）会激活大脑。来自神经元集合的响应提供了独特的多元指纹，可以区分非爆炸性化学物种和彼此之间的爆炸性蒸气。值得注意的是，目标化学识别可以在曝光后几百毫秒内实现。总而言之，我们的研究首次证明了可以如何劫持生物嗅觉系统（传感器和计算）来开发电子人的化学传感方法。