( CNN ) It 's long been known that dogs and cats , with their highly developed sense of smell , can be trained to identify the volatile chemicals released by human illnesses . In some cases , researchers have even trained household pets to detect cancer or predict epileptic seizures . But what if we could fine tune that sense and put it into a microchip , allowing us to create a breathalyzer for diseases ? For Dr. Andrew Koehl , the inventor of the microchip spectrometer technology at the heart of this `` digital nose '' , the technology that will allow us to do just that is already here . `` We can detect down to parts per billion levels , '' Koehl says . `` To give you an analogy that 's equivalent to one drop in an Olympic size swimming pool . '' The sensor , which is no bigger than a dime , works by creating a spectrum of what chemicals are in the air . It then identifies each chemical 's unique make-up . If the sensor is set and calibrated to a certain level , it will trigger an alarm . Work continues to shrink it even further in a bid to enter the healthcare market . Within several years , the company hopes to develop it as a diagnostic tool . `` What 's amazing is that there really are compounds on your breath that indicate illness , that 's been shown through a number of studies and we can detect those , '' he said . `` There have already been a number of research papers published suggesting we can detect cancer , detect tuberculosis , detect asthma . '' Initially , the technology had been developed for defense purposes . He said the threat posed by the events of September 11 had got him thinking about the security applications of this type of sensor . `` Originally it was aimed at detecting things like explosives , toxic chemicals and other threats that might occur , '' Dr Koehl told CNN . Developed at a research lab at the University of Cambridge in the UK and now in commercial production at a company called Owlstone with close links to the university , Dr Koehl says the sensor is already in use by oil industry giants like BP and Shell and in the food industry by Coca Cola and Nestle . Eventually the sensor could become a part of many everyday appliances , alerting consumers to which foods are going bad in the fridge or even the optimum moment to take the roast out of the oven . You could even , one day , have a digital nose that you could carry in your hip pocket . `` More recently we 've been looking at consumer spaces so we 're talking to a number of manufacturers of mobile phones and mobile phone components , '' he said . `` We want to develop a module small enough to put into mobile devices like phones . ''
Researches know that dogs and cats can sometimes detect diseases with their keen sense of smell . Owlstone has created a microchip that can detect chemical molecules in the air with great accuracy . The chips are small enough to be implanted into pets, but large enough for humans to see them. Its 'digital nose ' can already detect down to parts per billion , equivalent to one drop in an Olympic swimming pool .