Patent ID: 6885440

Claim:
A system for detecting and classifying an airborne biological particle, comprising; a single laser to illuminate an individual biological particle wherein the particle is dimensioned to be an inhalable particle; a first detector to detect light scattered due to illumination of the airborne biological particle by the laser; a second detector to detect fluorescence emission from the airborne biological particle due to illumination of the airborne biological particle by the laser; a processor to determine a first peak or integrated pulse amount of light detected by the first detector, a second peak or integrated pulse amount of light detected by the second detector, and to calculate a ratio of the first and second peak or integrated pulse and to compare to a library comprising a plurality of ratios of scattering peaks to auto-fluorescence peaks; and wherein the processor compares the calculated ratio with the plurality of ratios stored in the library to classify the airborne biological particle in substantially real-time.