Laser can detect diseases in your breath

* Laser can detect diseases in your breath: Device identifies compounds that may indicate cancer, asthma, study shows *

A new laser technique could enable doctors to detect certain diseases, such as lung cancer or asthma, simply by analyzing a patient's breath.

A new study shows the laser system can identify trace levels of compounds that may be signs of disease in breath samples, and companies and investors have already expressed interest in developing the device for routine use in doctor's offices, said Jun Ye, a physicist at JILA, a joint institute of the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the University of Colorado at Boulder, who led the research.

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