Electronic Detection of Pesticide Residues on Cherry Fruits

Abstract

Agriculture is one of the most basic needs for the human generation to be sustained. In agriculture, pesticides are indispensable to increase productivity and prevent crop losses. Some of these drugs are pesticides that protect the plant from harmful insects, fungi and rodents, while others are herbicides that protect it from weeds. However, if these chemicals penetrate people as much as they ensure food safety, they can be harmful to various diseases in the long term. After these pesticides are applied to agricultural products, they decrease to safe levels after 3-10 days, depending on the type and dosage of the drug. Long-term exposure to these chemicals can cause several health problems, such as cancer, hormonal disorders, neurological diseases and immune system weakness. This study investigated whether the collected and pesticide-free cherry could be separated by smell after the pesticide was applied to it without passing the mentioned time. Cherries were collected from cherry trees that had never been sprayed; pesticide was sprayed on these trees, and cherries sprayed with pesticide were collected a day later. An electronic nose consisting of 11 very affordable gas sensors has been made for the study. The electronic nose took one hundred pieces of odours, including different amounts of cherries with and without pesticides. Various attributes of these data have been extracted. Among the four classification algorithms, the Extra Trees Classifier has the most successful results with 94.30% classification accuracy, 93.00% sensitivity and 95.60% specificity classification success. The ability to detect the pesticides on the fruit with an electronic device is important for monitoring human health through food inspections.