Method and apparatus for identifying a chemical compound

An apparatus (100A) for identifying a chemical compound (112) from a sample (106), the apparatus (100A) comprises:

• a cover plate (102) for focusing a terahertz beam (108);
• a bottom plate (104) for enhancing an absorption signal of the sample (106) to the terahertz beam (108),
• wherein the sample (106) is configured to be sandwiched between the cover plate (102) and the bottom plate (104) for absorbing the terahertz beam (108).
• a terahertz time-domain spectroscopy module (110) for acquiring terahertz time-domain spectroscopy (THz TDS) data for the sample (106);
• and
• a processor (120) configured to implement a trained machine learning model (130), the trained machine learning model (130) being trained on a training dataset (114) comprising at least a pure compound dataset (114a) and a mixture dataset (114b), the trained machine learning model (130) configured to:
• process (804) an acquired THz TDS data (116) for obtaining a reduced dimensionality dataset (118) associated with the acquired THz TDS data (116);
• extract (806) at least one feature (118a) from the reduced dimensionality dataset (118), wherein the at least one feature (118a) comprises at least an absorption spectra parameter (118a1);
• generate (808) a classification label (122) for the reduced dimensionality dataset (118) based on the extraction (806) of the at least one feature (118a);
• and
• indicate (810) a probability of identifying the chemical compound (112) in the sample (106), based on the classification label (122) generated.