Photonics Driving Economic Growth in Europe - Photonics21

60 Towards 2020 – Photonics driving economic growth in Europe
Optical methods will
provide breakthrough
solutions for sensing
hazardous substances.
The WHO estimates that
more than two billion
illnesses are caused by
unsafe food every year.
2.5 Security, Metrology & Sensors
Main socio-economic challenges addressed
Today, over 70 million organic and inorganic
substances are on record 9 , and for most of
these, little is known about their potential
danger to humans. Although only a small
fraction of this plethora of molecules are mar-
keted and released into the environment, our
society is confronted daily with a growing
number of potentially hazardous chemicals.
Well-known examples of the reality of this threat
include the contamination of milk with melamine,
of drinking water with herbicides and fungicides,
of wine with glycol, and of plastic food containers
with hormone-like components (endocrine disrup-
tive compounds). As a result, increasingly and often
justifiably, our citizens feel threatened by potential
hazards contained in the foodstuffs they eat and
drink, and in the air they breathe.
Much worse, naturally occurring molecules, produced
by microorganisms within our food, represent
an even larger threat to our society’s health.
The WHO estimates that more than two billion
illnesses are caused by unsafe food every year,
and in the developing world alone, two million
children die annually from contaminated food and
water 810 . In Western countries, 5–10 people per
million inhabitants die every year from food borne
diseases 911 . In the USA alone, this claims an annual
9 On-line Registry of the Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS)
of the American Chemical Society: http://www.cas.org
10 WHO Reports on Food Safety Issues, WHO Global Strategy
for Food Safety: Safer Foord for Better Health, World Health
Organization, Food Safety Department, Geneva (Switzerland)
2002, ISBN 92 4 154574 7
11 D. Pimentel et al., Ecoloy of Increasing Diseases: Population
Growth and Environmental Degradation, Hum Ecol Vol. 35:
653–668, 2007
death toll of more than 3000 people, costing up to
$35 billion in medical costs and lost productivity 1012 .
Already today, we possess the biochemical and
technical means to identify small numbers of
molecules or microbes in a sample. However, all
these methods are expensive and time-consuming.
Optical methods may provide breakthrough solutions
to this highly relevant problem, overcoming
the traditional, tedious chemical lab analysis. For
example, it is known that measurement techniques
in the mid-infrared (MIR) spectral range, known
also as the fingerprinting/diagnostic region, are
highly specific to individual molecules, even able to
distinguish between isotopes in their atomic constituents.
Optical methods can also be extremely
sensitive, exploiting the existence of photonic
sensors capable of detecting the arrival of single
photons with sub-nanosecond timing precision.
Additionally, very sensitive and highly specific novel
diagnostic techniques are emerging, such as Raman
and LIBS spectroscopy, whose performance would
be much improved if operation could be extended
into the infrared spectral range. However, the major
problem with the current photonic devices and
detection systems capable of achieving the required
specifications is that they are much too expensive
for the realisation of affordable, practical sensing
systems! Consequently, if the challenges described
above for food/air/water/environmental safety and
security, are to be solved, it is essential that multiband
photonic sensing is developed, leading to
a safer and more secure society. Once available,
these photonic innovations will lead to numerous
additional applications, further improving many
aspects of our daily lives.
Major Photonics needs
The near infrared (NIR) spectral range (0.8–2.5
µm) is already employed for many tasks in food
inspection (moisture sensing, content of protein/
12 Wikipedia article on Foodborne Diseases: http://en.wikipedia.
org/wiki/Foodborne_illness