New handheld breathalyzer flags fat burning in real time
A handheld breathalyzer developed with ETH Zurich researchers detects acetone in breath to indicate real-time ketosis and fat burning, enabling at-home weight-management monitoring. It uses a smartphone-guided exhalation and separates acetone before measurement, and its readings aligned with a gold-standard PTR-MS method in a small 12-person trial. If validated in more people, it could help users manage weight without waiting for scale changes; further testing is needed before widespread use.
