3G – check; EDGE – check; MMS messages – check; Blood analysis kit – che.. eh, um, what?
Scientists at UCLA have taken an off-the-shelf mobile phone (looks like a Sony Ericsson Walman phone from here) and tinkered with it until it is able to serve as a portable microscope and automated analyser for blood samples.
The hacked handset is intended to be used by aid workers who need to quickly diagnose blood-borne diseases in the field. Traditional analysis equipment requires bulky microscopes and computers, but by shining a specially filtered light source (that is the big disc over the camera lens) through a blood sample, directly onto the phone’s camera, specially written software can detect the tell-tale signs of infection and even count the number of T-cells in HIV-infected patients.
The team calls the system LUCAS – Lensfree Ultrawide-?eld Cell-monitoring Array platform based on Shadow imaging. Although not ready for production yet, LUCAS could make blood analysis a much faster and cheaper option for medical teams and potentially save many lives.
via Wired
