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Scientists Hack Cellphone To Detect Diseases
Dave Bullock (eecue) plugs his piece up at Wired on a cellphone modded into a portable blood tester. This could become a significant piece of medical technology. "A new MacGyver-esque cellphone hack could bring cheap, on-the-spot disease detection to even the most remote villages on the planet. Using only an LED, plastic light filter, and some wires, scientists at UCLA have modded a cellphone into a portable blood tester capable of detecting HIV, malaria, and other illnesses. Blood tests today require either refrigerator-sized machines that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars or a trained technician who manually identifies and counts cells under a microscope. These systems are slow, expensive and require dedicated labs to function. And soon they could be a thing of the past."
And thus the building blocks of the medical tricorder are laid.
tack on a portal ultrasound, xray , and micro MRI and maybe doctors bills will start to come down.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
...would third-world nations have wires, a light filter and LEDs?
(then again, LEDs are something like < $1 each)
US businesses that currently accept chip and PIN/signature
If anyone is wondering how exactly this works, or wants to build their own, they might want to check out this Weekend Project
Basically, if you've got a (near-)point source of light, and transmit it through the sample, there is only one path of light from the light, through a point in the sample, to a pixel on the sensor, so you don't need a lens. The farther away you place the sample and the closer you place the light source, the larger the image appears (but then you also need to progressively use a better, closer to a true point source light).
I imagine this could work very well with a naked silicon laser diode, since they appear as damn tiny, near point sources of light.
We need to stop worrying about ending hunger there and start getting every last one of them a cell phone!
Posted by: jamesdionne:
I agree.
"In prison you just have to shut your eyes and take it. Here you have to shut your eyes and give it."
A. It can't detect HIV. No imaging technology short of electron microscopy can directly detect the virus itself and even electron microscope would be a retarded way to attempt diagnostics.
Even the original paper describing this technology showed that they have no sub-cellular resolution and even their size resolution was extremely unreliable for anything smaller than 15 microns... which all interesting human cells are (even if you could tell what size cells are you've accomplished.... nothing).
If they are suggesting they can do CD4+ T-lymphocyte counts they're either idiots, ignorant or both. There is no morphological distinction between a CD4+ and a CD4- T-lymphocyte. Even using fluorescence imaging (which they aren't) you have to be able to look at two colors of fluorescence (CD3 label to check to see if its a lymphocyte and a CD4 label to see if its CD4+) immunofluorescence is way too weak to be detected by a cell phone camera, especially a color sensor with 2 micron pixels. The CD4 antigen is never expressed at levels greater than approximately 50,000 / cell, the detection limit of a 5 micron pixel monochrome sensor (the bayer mask makes you lose about 30% of your light) is close to about 150,000 molecules. The bayer mask also makes your sensor pretty much useless for analytical applications, you're screwed if your green-fluorescent cell is centered over a red or blue-sensitive pixel which would happen in, oh, 66% of your pixels.
You run into almost identical sets of problems with every other so-called "application" of this "technology" so, yeah, bullshit.
IAABME.
"UCLA researcher Dr. Aydogan Ozcan images thousands of blood cells instantly by placing them on an off-the-shelf camera sensor and lighting them with a filtered-light source (coherent light, for you science buffs)."
So instead of Occam's Razor, this is Ozcan's RAZR?
...but does it run *nix?
Now my next gen iPhone will be able to tell me *precisely* when it causes my brain cancer.
I do not respond to cowards. Especially anonymous ones.
..did the cellphone have?
Here's the big BIG thing that is going to hit mainstream radar soon, though I haven't even seen much tech punditry as usual this year, with everyone so deflated over the economy, but I bechya this is going to be massive over the next few years. Re-waring / re-purposing, whatever you call it, basically a new layer and second wind to technology in developed AND developing countries. People stop building things from scratch, it's more expensive than reuse. Just make small mods.
For a decade or more, we've been producing basically general purpose computers disguised as specific function devices, like phones, pda and suchlike. This is the first fruits of tech convergence coupled with a tightening economy and environmental reluctance to dispose in landfills. Such industry will emerge based around unique, perculiar, creative repurposing of hardware en-masse, it becomes inevitable. Out of nowhere will come cellphones transformed into musical instruments, alarm clocks, intruder detectors, baby monitors, health aides, point to point walkie talkies, and from that ad-hoc userland communication networks that will eventually bypass and replace the telco choke point/gatekeeper model (In other words expect much development to be resisted and made "illegal" by vested interest groups under the cry of "health, safety and security".) But that will do nothing to stop this enevitable shift that prevailing conditions invite. Basically we have a situation of commodity hardware. The raw materials are zero cost (would already be in a landfill if the manufacturers had their way) and are easy to jailbreak/unlock and retask. There's something like 2 or 3 discarded cellphones to every person on Earth right now. Objects that cost less than a skilled hour of salary, can be retasked in seconds with firmware flashing and combining via USB or wifi networks. Certain models of things are obviously going to become really popular because they can be more easily rewared, their second hand value will rise again.
When it test's a patient positive for HIV, it plays a polyphonic ringtone of 'Always looks on the bright side of life'
What if Tetris was invented by Nazis?
I can see this possibly evolving into something that would be able to detect malaria infections, malaria is pretty big and easy enough to spot with good magnification and a little bit of training. Parasite laden blood cells are often chock-full of little plasmodium, so they would definitely have different optical properties in this kind of system. This could also probably do a reliable job of some basic blood values like hemoglobin levels, where the item in question has strong, distinct light-absorbing properties, but it won't come close to replacing an actual lab: there are too many things that just don't interact enough or interact distinctly enough with light to be measured that way, even if you had a lab-quality variable-frequency light source.
HIV, however, is a virus, and can not currently be detected or diagnosed microscopically (barring electron microscopes), so I'm a bit skeptical on that point. Besides, we have antibody tests that are cheap, effective and (thanks to foreign aid) available even in the poorest, most remote areas. The problem with testing for HIV is not detecting it, it's getting people tested. There is still a HUGE stigma around it, and people are (often with good reason) worried about the privacy of tests. If this guy has figured out how to detect and, more importantly, identify viruses using light microscopy, he'll be up for a Nobel prize, but I highly doubt that is the case. It's more likely that Wired just embellished the story a bit, which I think is unnecessary since even being able to quickly and reliably detect just parasites in the blood like malaria, leishmaniasis or trypanosomes would be a big help for many in the developing world.
I spent 2 years living in remote, rural Tanzania and some of the clinics near me diagnose malaria in every blood smear they see, because they don't have someone well trained enough to examine the blood, or they don't actually have a functioning microscope (they are freaking expensive, very fragile and hard to get out in the boonies) so they err on the side of caution. Even though they are probably correct a good percentage of the time, people were often "diagnosed" with malaria when they had none of the symptoms: Malaria gets the blame for nearly every ailment. This leads to overuse of anti-malarial drugs, which leads to drug-resistance. I also saw anemia being diagnosed very frequently as well, with out any way to properly test for it. It was the second most popular target for any ailment. "Anemic" people are encouraged to eat a substance made from red clay. It probably has plenty iron so it could actually help and probably can't do any harm, but it tasted about like you would expect dirt to taste.
To make my point: if this all this could do was detect malaria and hemoglobin levels, at even 10x the cost of a cell phone, but as portable and as durable as a cell phone (relative to a microscope that won't survive a car ride), it would make a sizable impact for a lot of people.
"Cheeze it!" - Bender
This makes me think of all the good medical advances that came straight out of Star Trek. Like the air needle thing where you just shoot it at someone's arm and the stuff goes in their arm through air pressure. Something similar to that is being developed to help prevent the spread of HIV. And I'm sure you have all seen something similar to this cell phone blood tester in every single sci-fi film.
Please visit http://www.mederbil.com/ i7, GTX 275, 4 1TB Caviar Green in RAID 0+1 array, EVGA X58 3X SLI Board, Silver
Only you (American) idiots don't realize that you have regulation (eg fu.. cun.) on radio, TV and trying on Internet _BUT_ at the same time have the bigest set of crooks on Wall Street ... just Google for Wall Street Fraud, with no regulation whatsoever.
... USA?
If you did not notice, the rest of the world is pissed, and we are clearly aware that it is not just George W Bush, it is YOU.
Fix it, but remember the world moves on anyway, eg Rome Portugal UK USSR
Shouldn't that be "Using only a LED"?
You wouldn't legally be able to use this in the U.S. because it would be a HIPAA violation to transmit health information over an unsecured channel. It does allow for SSL-level encryption, however.
BTM
That was the turning point of my life--I went from negative zero to positive zero.
A roll of film is not reusable.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
The family guy theme of:
You have AIDS!
(Yes you have AIDS)
I hate to tell you boy but you got AIDS...
Old NES consoles were equipped with an EKG cartridge that ran the software. Inputs were from sensors on the patient's body plugged into the controller ports. The display was any old TV they could get their hands on. Power on the console, power on the TV, el cheapo EKG that worked just fine.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
For the good of mankind.
And before anyone says a word about IP or profit motive, take a few minutes to think about how unchecked/unrealistic profit motive has lead the US and world economy.
Yes, the inventors/innovators (yup, that means the grad students as well professor) of this should make a tidy profit. This should not preclude non-profit use, and especially not preclude open discussion of how to make such potentially live saving technology better.
Its time for med-tech (and pharma) to come out of greed's dark ages.
If only they have used the magic "iPhone" incantation this would have been a success.
Like they did here. Not very scientistie.
Just compare these two titles.
"Scientists Hack Cellphone To Detect Diseases" and "Scientists Hack iPhone To Detect Diseases"
Can't you see just how much cooler the one on the right is?
No? Hmm...
Did you try crossing and uncrossing your eyes or viewing it on an iPhone screen?
It looks MUCH cooler on an iPhone...
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
So now if I catch my girlfriend with her mobile phone vibrating ...down there, she can claim it is just for 'medical reasons' (just running some tests...)
Essentially the same idea (web camera is even in TFA, without microscope tough). Or may be only web camera sensor. After that make a count with some blob detector, or some more complex pattern recognition soft. Of cause PC+camera+microscope would cost 3-4 times more than just microscope, but you wouldn't need qualified medic to operate it, and it would be faster too.
There seems to be a lot of misconceptions about how this thing works. I can only assume the misinformation comes from the wired article which I can not read (slashdotted?).
Anyhow here are some links I found on google;
http://uwnews.washington.edu/ni/article.asp?articleID=3045
http://www.rsc.org/publishing/journals/AN/article.asp?doi=b705672a
http://www.rsc.org/delivery/_ArticleLinking/DisplayHTMLArticleforfree.cfm?JournalCode=LC&Year=2008&ManuscriptID=b811158h&Iss=Advance_Article
http://arjournals.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.bioeng.10.061807.160524
I googled 'Washington university blood analyzer DxBox'
The research is lead from Washington University, with grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is apparently 'Open technology', and is currently called DxBox (a play on Microsoft xbox since BillG is funding a lot of the work).
slashdot troll = you make a compelling argument I do not like the implications of.
A friend of mine just launched a company to develop such a device. He's well on his way. The current team is assembling at Penn State.
http://www.mashavu.com/index.html
Please have a look at this pdf (which admittedly uses OECD data from AD 2000, so they might be somewhat outdated, but it will do to make my point)
On page 9 you'll see that public health spending (as a %age of total) is lowest in the US, (and highest in Sweden) and on page 10 you'll see that the total amount spent per person on healthcare in the US is nearly 73% higher than in the next country listed (Germany).
Next, if you have a look at the CIA World Factbook: (website isn't working here, so using wikisource)
and look at the figures for average life expectancy in the US compared to socialist Europe, the average in the US: about 74 (male) and 80 (female), whereas in Sweden, (which admittedly has better life expectancy than some EU countries, but i can't be arsed to find the median country) it's 78/82 years (2004 est)).
Additionally, the Infant mortality rates:
US: 6.63 deaths/1,000 live births
Swe: total: 2.77 deaths/1,000 live births
Sweden's per capita spending: less than 1700$
United States per capita spending: 4100$
Please show me how or why "government healthcare is bound to fail", or, alternatively, have a look at actual data.
(Disclaimer: since 2004 a number of european countries are reforming/considering reforms to health care funding, because it's inefficient in some ways. Nevertheless, the fact remains that health care spending here costs less than half of what it costs in the US.)
They should just get Android,
int SENSOR_TRICORDER A constant describing a Tricorder When this sensor is available and enabled, the device can be used as a fully functional Tricorder. 64 0x00000040
It's got the tricorder function already :D
Insurance, in law and economics, is a form of risk management primarily used to hedge against the risk of a contingent loss. Insurance is defined as the equitable transfer of the risk of a loss, from one entity to another, in exchange for a premium, and can be thought of as a guaranteed small loss to prevent a large, possibly devastating loss. An insurer is a company selling the insurance; an insured is the person or entity buying the insurance.
So you're saying this *does* apply to taxes and public healthcare, but not to private health care?
because it seems to me to be really, really arbitrary how you don't see one as stealing, but you do the other.
And considering that US per capita health care spending is more than double that of the other G7/European countries, (see my other comment in this thread if you like) I'd say you should care more about getting the care costs down, as that will automatically lower (the need for those idiotically high) premiums.
It's outright sad that one third to half the US doesn't have access to health care, and that (anecdotal point) "Free Clinics" can still charge you 200$ for their free services. (this was for an SF guy i know who needed an allergy prescription worth 20$)
And it's all made possible because of that weird fiction that health care is something special, rather than a basic right.
It allows doctors to charge more (although they also have to pay enormous tuition fees because of lack of government funding), insurers to require more (because people can opt out, there's less carrying power or whatever it's called, because of the reduced number of people paying into the system, which means the costs can be spread less), and so on.
imagine how much more affordable health care could be if spending was more in line with european spending.. you'd be able to keep healthy 60-80% more people easily at the same cost, people who then would also have smaller chances of contracting other illnesses (prevention is better than cure and all), who could work more (because they were healthier), and so on.
Choosing to have a partially-diseased workforce is stealing from your GNP just as much as other things are.. it just depends on how far ahead you're able/willing to look.
I walk, i don't use the road only the sidewalk therefor a road is of no direct benefit to me. So you based on what you say you have stolen from me?
While i agree on the TV and Car, Health care (equal health care for all) I believe is a fundamental right we each should have.
Now you might want to look at how much money from taxes go to a universal Health care system that say a Canadian pays over their entire life time now look at how much you pay in insurance. Compare the two.
people need to remember that it is not only you income tax or sales taxes that make up the Gov. coffers.
to me the most important feature of a free health care system is if you just lost you job because of the economic slow down, and you missed you last insurance payment, and suddenly you kid gets a rare disease you don't have to worry if he is covered or not, you just take him to the nearest hospital and let the Dr. make him better.
Hell you could have 3 types of cancer and 10 different genetic disorders and you know what... you still covered... name on insurance deal would look at you? you never know what the future holds but if we each help each other well... then not even you will fall through the cracks, because the rich and easily become poor.
This is a neat idea, but wouldn't it be more practical to have made it as a USB device?
It should be a simple enough matter to make one. The hard part is the software. I don't suppose this is open sourced, is it?
A field tech with a laptop and USB device could test samples of thousands of people. This phone method appears very kludgy. A properly configured setup would easily be able to tie in with a centralized database to not only evaluate the samples, but provide statistical information on the spread or current infected areas. The field tech would already be aware of what problems may exist in the area, and then he'd simply be finding out who needs isolation and treatment.
If they open sourced the software, I could (in theory) run to the store today, modify a camera with an LED and filter, and test anyone who wanted to give a sample. It would go from "I got to the doctor once a year for a physical" to "I do my own bloodwork at home, and go as soon as there is a problem."
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
.... oh wait... it was just my phone telling my I have aids.