FEM_BREATH:

Development of breath tests for personalised medicine

(2014-2016)

A project carried out at Innsbruck Medical University and at the Institute for Breath Research of the University of Innsbruck with partner schools in Austria and Poland.

FEM_BREATH encourages pupils to detect volatile organic compounds as disease markers supported by our scientists and develops new medical breath tests. FEM_BREATH supports the interest of pupils for technical studies, and connects the schools involved with university research more closely. The pupils contribute to all research tasks actively, such as scientific literature search, working in clinical environment, lab work, measurements with analytical devices, biostatistical analysis and data interpretation.

FEM_BREATH validates a breath test for measurement of the activity of the enzyme Cytochrom P 450 2C19 (CYP2C19) which is important for patients undergoing cardiovascular therapy with the drug clopidogrel. The activity of CYP2C19 differs in individual patients: depending on its activity, the effectiveness of Clopidogrel therapy can vary. Therefore our breath test delivers important information for the individual patients.

Furthermore, the analysis of human breath for cancer diagnosis is investigated. Linus Pauling, a double Nobel Prize Laureate, was the breath research pioneer. He discovered that human breath contains around 200 volatile organic compounds. The most prominent breath test allows detection of infection with helicobacter pylori bacteria in the gut – similarly it could be possible to develop breath tests for early cancer diagnosis, diabetes, liver and renal diseases by breath analysis. FEM_BREATH attaches value on equity of both sexes in research.