A Review of Contact Sensors Used for Monitoring Malodorous Gas in Animal Facilities

Abstract

Animal facilities produce large amounts of harmful gases, and many of them have a pungent odor such as ammonia, hydrogen sulfide and other malodorous gases. The malodorous gases generated by animal house not only affect the health of people and livestock but also pollute the air. The detection of the malodorous gases can effectively improve efficiency of livestock production and reduce environmental pollution. More and more gas detection method is applied to the detection of the malodorous gases generated by animal house. This paper summarizes contact sensors for monitoring of malodorous gases in animal house recently, including semiconductor sensors electrochemical sensors and electronic nose. The basic principle and the characteristics of these methods were illustrated and the applications on the detection of malodorous gases in animal house were described. Meanwhile, the researches of malodorous gases monitoring for livestock production applied contact sensors were listed. The status quo and future development of the contact sensors for malodorous gases generated by animal house were summarized.