Short-Wave Infrared Spectroscopy for On-Site Discrimination of Hazardous Mineral Fibers Using Machine Learning Techniques

Asbestos fibers are well-known carcinogens, and their rapid detection is critical for ensuring safety, protecting public health, and promoting environmental sustainability. In this work, short-wave infrared (SWIR) spectroscopy, combined with machine learning (ML), was evaluated as an environmentally friendly analytical approach for simultaneously distinguishing the asbestos type, asbestos-containing materials in various forms, asbestos-contaminated/-uncontaminated soil, and asbestos-contaminated/-uncontaminated cement, simultaneously. This approach offers a noninvasive and efficient alternative to traditional laboratory methods, aligning with sustainable practices by reducing hazardous waste generation and enabling in situ testing. Different chemometrics techniques were applied to discriminate the material classes. In more detail, partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA), principal component analysis-based discriminant analysis (PCA-DA), principal component analysis-based K-nearest neighbors classification (PCA-KNN), classification and regression trees (CART), and error-correcting output-coding support vector machine (ECOC SVM) classifiers were tested. The tested classifiers showed different performances in discriminating between the analyzed samples. CART and ECOC SVM performed best (RecallM and AccuracyM equal to 1.00), followed by PCA-KNN (RecallM of 0.98 – 1.00 and AccuracyM equal to 1.00). Poorer performances were obtained by PLS-DA (RecallM of 0.68 – 0.72 and AccuracyM equal to 0.95) and PCA-DA (RecallM of 0.66 – 0.70 and AccuracyM equal to 0.95). This research aligns with the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), by enhancing human health protection through advanced asbestos detection methods, and SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production), by promoting sustainable, low-waste testing methodologies.