Most plants including food plants respond to herbivore attack by increasing the emission of ‘odors’ (volatile organic compounds, VOCs) to attract the natural enemies of the herbivores. The detection of these herbivore-induced odors in agricultural crop fields may allow early detection of pests and enable more effective and sustainable plant protection in the future, where direct control can be done more precisely, only on affected plants. To contribute to this goal, we study the potential of commercial gas sensors based on metal-oxide (MOX) surfaces for measuring VOCs in the agricultural context. We use Sensirion’s SGP40 sensor (Sensirion AG, Stäfa, Switzerland), an inexpensive, state-of-the-art VOC sensor. We present our first measurements of the SGP40’s sensor response to changes in relative water vapor concentration and to changes in VOC concentration originating from a small amount of ink. Finally, we demonstrate a 48h measurement of the total VOC originating from a maize plant grown in a standard plant pot.
Frandino et al. (2026) studied this question.