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Turning a Smart Phone Into a Microscope

Posted by timothy on from the now-it's-genius dept.

MTorrice writes "By attaching a lightweight, inexpensive device to the back of a smart phone, scientists can convert the phone into a sensitive fluorescence microscope. The attachment [paper abstract] allows the phone's camera to take pictures of single nanoparticles and viruses, possibly providing a portable diagnostic tool for health care workers in developing countries. For example, doctors in remote regions could use the technique to measure HIV viral loads in patients' blood samples, allowing the doctors to easily monitor disease progression and determine the best course of treatment."

43 comments

  1. Of course... by Skiron · · Score: 3, Funny

    [allowing the doctors to easily monitor disease progression and determine the best course of treatment.]

    They could use the phone to call for expert help.

    1. Re:Of course... by drinkypoo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Or the phone could diagnose the disease, or forward imagery on to some system which will do the same. That's why I got involved with infragram, in the hope that at some point I'll end up with a mobile device which can do the processing onboard. I had to say it, but this might actually be a decent excuse to use the Pi, with the camera module.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    2. Re:Of course... by fatphil · · Score: 1

      Or they could instagram a hilarious photo of a guy with blood running out of his eyes, and tweet "#YOLO - only briefly in this case" for the lulz.

      --
      Also FatPhil on SoylentNews, id 863
  2. That's what I want by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Google storing my nanoparticles.

  3. Nice, but... by Heshler · · Score: 2

    This is neat... but this device is probably not going to be useful in the field anytime soon. The tests described were performed on pre-purified, pre-stained, pre-smeared virus. These steps still require a lab to perform. And if you are already in a lab, might as well use a nice microscope. This is the real problem in point-of-care diagnostics, and the reason we don't all have our own personal medical tricorders yet. Big advances are still needed.

  4. attaching lenses to camera produces microscope... by Joining+Yet+Again · · Score: 2

    ...may have benefit where microscopes are useful.

    Developments at 11!

  5. the stage by goombah99 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    one of the smallest things in a microscope is the lens. most of the microscope is precision, vibration damped, gearing to manipulate the focal distance precisely. If you are going for high resolution its not yet clear to me how you avoid the expensive non-portable part of the microscope.

    --
    Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
    1. Re:the stage by goombah99 · · Score: 2

      one of the smallest things in a microscope is the lens. most of the microscope is precision, vibration damped, gearing to manipulate the focal distance precisely. If you are going for high resolution its not yet clear to me how you avoid the expensive non-portable part of the microscope.

      Answering my own question: Been staring at their schematic diagram. What I think they are doing is relying on the thinness of thr sample to avoid having a long range over which to focus. then they are not worrying too much about the reproducible adjustment of the X and Y directions. this might let them get away with a precision casted fixed distance that could be trimmed to perfection over a small range then fixed.

      --
      Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
    2. Re:the stage by YttriumOxide · · Score: 3, Informative

      one of the smallest things in a microscope is the lens. most of the microscope is precision, vibration damped, gearing to manipulate the focal distance precisely. If you are going for high resolution its not yet clear to me how you avoid the expensive non-portable part of the microscope.

      Don't forget, this isn't talking about a standard "microscope" but rather a "fluorescence microscope", which is actually a fairly different thing.

      The linked article (and linked paper abstract) has images that give you an idea of what they're doing much better than TFA does.

      --
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    3. Re:the stage by serviscope_minor · · Score: 2

      Don't forget, this isn't talking about a standard "microscope" but rather a "fluorescence microscope", which is actually a fairly different thing.

      No it isn't.

      They are basically exactly the same and the widefield fluorescence microscopes can operate in both normal and fluorescence mode. Fluorescence microscopes have an additional filter cube in the beamline so you can focus the incident light using the same optics as the image and to filter out the reflected light so that only the fluorescent light reaches the CCD.

      If you remove the cube, then you have a regular microscope and in fact vendors sell both types using the same optics and body.

      The GP is right. The things that really help with resolution are the huge heavy steel air table and a really solid, well aligned frame. Also, the thing that helps with sensitivity is having a good quality camera. A cooled SCMOS or EMCCD being the best options, the latter being both the best and most expensive.

      The smartphone has none of those.

      But then I looked at TFA. The PSF is about 2um, which is nearly 10x worse than the best possible (about 240 or so).

      Having actually being involved in some fluorescence microscopy projects, I'm a little skeptical of the use since apparently getting good labelling is somewhere between a total bitch and a complete black art, and that's in a well equipped lab. I wouldn't fancy my chances with field-labelled fluorescence microscopy.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
    4. Re:the stage by umafuckit · · Score: 2

      Don't forget, this isn't talking about a standard "microscope" but rather a "fluorescence microscope", which is actually a fairly different thing.

      No it isn't.

      I disagree, it is a fairly different thing when you're talking about miniaturising it. I could stick a lens onto a phone cam and call it a microscope but it's not so trivial to turn a phone into a compact fluorescence microscope. You can't just whack in a Olympus filter cube, you need to think it through a little more. These guys have done a pretty good job of miniaturising the fluorescence microscope. As you say, the resolution is shitty (probably because objective NA is small). I can't see a use for the thing but I can appreciate it's geek cred. Some labelling is easy to do, though, it depends on the sample, so it might be possible for this thing to have field uses.

      --
      soylentnews.org
  6. Can't... take... the STUPID! by pla · · Score: 2

    By attaching a lightweight, inexpensive device to the back of a smart phone

    By "device", you mean... A fluorescence microscope? Camera works as camera??? Whoah, major breakthrough, dude!

    Hey! What do you suppose would happen if, instead of using a $300 phone as a camera (with all its controls inconveniently under the device), we used a $20 USB webcam?

    Pinky, bring me the yak!

    1. Re: Can't... take... the STUPID! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah the first thing I thought was: Fancy Scientists Invent Device That Turns Human Eye Into Microscope.

    2. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by sleepypsycho · · Score: 2

      It is not so stupid as it sounds. Yes, they basically attached a fluorescent microscope. However, there was some engineering involved and there area some benefits over a web cam.
      - Built in capabilities.
            - connectivity allowing for remote diagnoses, software upgrades etc
            - phone providing very large range of travel and maintaining data access
            - storage of image can be linked with other patient data
            - OS for automatic analysis, image enhancement etc
            - high quality monitor with build in zoom function
      - Versatility. Other aspects of the phone can be used for other apps such as making phone call, looking up research or related material, GPS
      - Ubiquity. Smart phones are showing up all over the place,
              - third world countries are skipping wired and going directly to wireless
              - used equipment is available cheaply and deliver significant bang for the buck because the original purchase was defrayed by data plan
      - Camera quality. Phone camera quality has become quite good.
      - Engineering the fluorescent microscope to the form factor is not trivial.
      All that said, staining is probably a pretty big hurdle for field diagnostics. On the other hand a mobile clinic might have more capabilities. The device would not need to be used by one doctor making a house call..

    3. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by dfghjk · · Score: 1

      None of these things differentiate a smartphone from a notebook PC with a cabled webcam and a notebook would be superior in many ways.

      "Very large range of travel" is not a feature of a smartphone, is it simply capable of enabling that. Other devices are too, namely devices a webcam connects to.

      Not sure how you consider these points you made to be "engineering" either.

    4. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by interkin3tic · · Score: 1
      Have you ever seen a normal fluorescence microscope? They're not portable, lightweight, and they're not cheap.

      With fluorescent microscopes, researchers can detect and study important biomolecules or single cells that they’ve labeled with fluorescent dyes. But the instruments are bulky and expensive, says Aydogan Ozcan at the University of California, Los Angeles. As a result, people with limited resources, such as those in developing countries, often don’t have access to these diagnostic tools.

      Why is it with every story on slashdot that is ACTUALLY ABOUT SCIENCE, there's some guy here talking uninformed trash on it?

    5. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Poor people in poor areas have tremendous value out of a mobile phone. In some areas, that's the one and only way to access banking services. You get to know whether there's work today at site A or site B before walking 2 hours to get there. There are so many advantages that it makes sense for poor people get these things despite the cost - you'll get scenarios where one person buys the phone and rents it out on a minute basis. These people do not have a computer to plug a USB webcam into. The point of projects such as these is to turn the device that these people already have access to into something even more useful to them.

    6. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by pla · · Score: 1

      Have you ever seen a normal fluorescence microscope? They're not portable, lightweight, and they're not cheap.

      Yes, actually - I've even used one.


      Why is it with every story on slashdot that is ACTUALLY ABOUT SCIENCE, there's some guy here talking uninformed trash on it?

      I think you might have mistaken my criticism as pointed in the wrong direction. The "story", as presented, does contain complete trash. The real story here involves these folks making a lightweight, portable fluorescence microscope - Not that they used a cellphone's camera in place of a dedicated CCD.

      "Researchers make a lightweight, portable fluorescence microscope", however, wouldn't have made it to the front page of Slashdot. Made it a cool cellphone mod, however, and BAM, open the firehose.

    7. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Generally places where you can't easily take small portable medical equipment is are also the places where your mobile data plan won't work.

      Sure, phone camera quality is getting better, however camera camera quality is getting even better than that!

    8. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by interkin3tic · · Score: 1

      Ah, well then my rage was misplaced. I'm sorry for that, and specifically for calling you uninformed.

    9. Re:Can't... take... the STUPID! by pla · · Score: 1

      No, you had the right idea in general, just chose a suboptimal target for it. Overall, I agree with your sentiment. People (even Slashdotters) would, sadly, rather discuss 101 ways to hack their XBox than hear about any "real" scientific breakthroughs short of a Higgs Boson level discovery. :)

      Cheers!

  7. Fluorescent detection yes, but not a microscope by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's not a microscope. It's a very sensitive fluorescence detector of nano-particles, but calling it imaging isn't quite right. You don't get pictures, you get dots. Even getting the dots relies on being able to fluorescently label what you want to detect. That's not straight-forward unless you've already got a good idea what you're looking for. If I'm going to spend several thousand dollars on a fluorescent antibody to label something, I'm going to do my imaging with a proper confocal microscope, not a cell phone. That's like putting an F1 engine into a honda civic. Interesting, but there's no way you're going to get F1 speeds out a Honda Civic, no matter what kind of engine you put into it. If you have the money for an F1 engine, you put it in an F1 chassis and get a trained driver to run it. Otherwise, maybe you want to think carefully about whether you really want to be in the F1 business.

    1. Re:Fluorescent detection yes, but not a microscope by sleepypsycho · · Score: 1

      It certainly is a microscope. It can build up an image out of those dots. The real question is what is the true resolution and are there meaningful applications for that resolution. Plenty of interesting things can be found without high resolution, so there needs to value provide the resolution. Those tiny dots are blurring to about 2 um. Individual cells are roughly 4 to 8 um range. So you can probably spot individual cells. This is a lot more valuable with second image, either transmitted light or a second fluorescent wavelength. With two images you can do % of cells of a certain type. For example, percent of live cells, percent of cells with a specific protein etc. You can probably get reasonable number just by coverage areas even if the cells are not separable. What you can do with a single wavelength is more limited. You can get more accurate counts, Maybe you can develop a two stage assay: Stain for article of interest, Take a picture. Stain for all cells. Now you have %.

    2. Re:Fluorescent detection yes, but not a microscope by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They aren't imaging nano-particles or viruses. They can't because you can't get sub-wavelength resolution with optical methods (at least not with the kinds you would use a cell phone camera to record). You're right, they might be able to get whole cells, but probably not with enough detail to see anything interesting other than whether they are there or not. You won't get morphology, you won't get organelles, you certainly won't get anything close to a virus (if they are there and you've stained for them you'll see dots, but not whether they are inside or outside the cell, and unless they are really dispersed, probably not clear enough to quantify from the cell phone image.)

      The point of my comment was that the fluorescent stain is non-trivial, and hard to use properly in the field without lab facilities. If you've got the money for that, you've probably got a lab with a proper microscope that will show you a whole lot more. You can probably use a fluorophore or a quantum dot, but in order to attach it to anything useful, you'll need an antibody, and those still don't come cheap.

    3. Re:Fluorescent detection yes, but not a microscope by dfghjk · · Score: 1

      "Those tiny dots are blurring to about 2 um. Individual cells are roughly 4 to 8 um range. So you can probably spot individual cells."

      Assuming good optics and sufficient magnification, neither of which is inherently a properly of smartphone cameras. It is quite difficult to achieve meaningful resolution down to the photosite level of a sensor and smartphones don't make that a goal.

      Talking resolution in the absence and many important details is something a fool would do. Love the hand-waving, though, it matches nicely your previous comment. You are quite the /. engineer.

    4. Re:Fluorescent detection yes, but not a microscope by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can still image viruses and their location without implying you can resolve details of a virus. We image stars all the time with equipment that is not capable of resolving any detail, but it is still called imaging.

    5. Re:Fluorescent detection yes, but not a microscope by sleepypsycho · · Score: 1

      It seems to me there is information there. A tiny particle blurs to 2 um. Hence it clear that you can't meaningfully distinguish between to particles less then roughly 1 um. http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/diffraction-photography.htm. However, if the particles are 4 um apart I can definitely distinguish them. I am sure I can do this because if I look at the image present, the dot is blurred, meaning there are multiple pixel for the single spot. Sure it is possible the that the image is super zoomed up and what we are seeing is software smoothing of a single pixel or some kind of compression algorithm creating a false sense of resolution. To my eye this does not seem to be the case [yes, very subjective/speculative statement here]. Phone cameras are now boasting 41 MPixel chips http://www.nokia.com/us-en/phones/phone/lumia1020/specifications/ This is a lot higher spacial resolution than most scientific cameras used with fluorescent microscopes so it is not far fetched to expect camera resolution is not the limiting factor. So yes, there is a little bit of assumption that the people who built this thing knew a little bit about what they are doing and are purely "faking" it. With that in mind the basis for my claims is there in the article.

      Of course the other post has plenty of hand waving. The only point of that is that there are reasons why the particular implementation may not be stupid, not that I know all the details of what was done.

  8. Wow by Frankie70 · · Score: 2

    I attached a football to my smartphone and turned my smartphone into a football.

  9. Re:attaching lenses to camera produces microscope. by interkin3tic · · Score: 2

    That's not a fluorescent microscope though.

    Fluorescent imaging involves shining excitation light of a specific wavelength at the sample, and filtering out any light but the emission spectrum light. THEN there's the lens. Build your own fluorescent microscope and I'd be impressed. Build your own fluorescent microscope that can fit in your pocket, and that's actually an achievement.

    At least, I think it is, compared the usual slashdot stories. "OMG, the next android is going to be named KIT KAT!!!!" Or "Copyright troll... SUES SOMEONE FOR SOMETHING STUPID!!!"

  10. Not in the US of A by deviated_prevert · · Score: 4, Informative
    For determining the viral load of a patent in the US the software necessary to image detect most viruses is patent encumbered. The gold standard test to determine the viral load of HCV is under a ridiculous patent and as such is completely out of reach for easy wide scale use. Using the physical image shape of the HCV virus and others is patented and you are not allowed to develop software to assay it, this is the only reason why in Canada the test is only done once on HepC patients and doctors are told not to order the test because it is out of this world expensive because of the site license costs of software to do the test.

    These diagnostic patents are all held and defended by the American drug company cartels who hold the world ransom. Same thing applies to the detection of the breast cancer gene, that is why you only see the wealthy being tested for this indicator gene, then deciding to have their breasts removed if they inherited the gene. Nothing is holding back the rapid advancement of diagnostics more than the drug company cartels and they need to be broken up permanently the same way standard oil was dealt with!

    All well and good developing cheap portable diagnostic devices but if ideas like, doing assay by the software counting a specific shape can be individually patented per shape and are then held ransom by crooked corporations with cooked up patents these devices will be far too expensive to do any good at all.

    --
    This message was not sent from an iPhone because Peter Sellers really was a deviated prevert without a dime for the call
    1. Re:Not in the US of A by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Breaking News!

      The US Patent system is fucked,

      Moar news at 11

    2. Re:Not in the US of A by kermidge · · Score: 2

      You've just brought up one of those inconvenient realities that are generally swept under the rug and don't make it into any kind of public discussion. I wasn't aware of this until the breast cancer gene thing a few years back and one link lead to another kind of thing. Holding health hostage may make for profit but not friends. Eventually enough enemies can overturn the idiocy. Well, we can hope. A bunch of complacent coupon clippers condemning people to death to help support their opulent lifestyle rather rubs me the wrong way.

      It's not realistic, but I wouldn't mind if Canada repudiated the patents and stole the software, for instance.

      (personal disclaimer - I've visited Ontario, city and province, thrice, and passed through twice, and have every time been amazed and humbled by how nicely I've been treated compared to the treatment I've seen Canadians put up with south of the border.)

    3. Re:Not in the US of A by umafuckit · · Score: 1

      These diagnostic patents are all held and defended by the American drug company cartels who hold the world ransom. Same thing applies to the detection of the breast cancer gene, that is why you only see the wealthy being tested for this indicator gene, then deciding to have their breasts removed if they inherited the gene. Nothing is holding back the rapid advancement of diagnostics more than the drug company cartels and they need to be broken up permanently the same way standard oil was dealt with!

      Myriad no longer has a monopoly on the BRAC breast cancer markers: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/supreme-court-strikes-down-breast-cancer-gene-patent-175640515.html They may keep fighting this, but this patent is crumbling. Where is your link for the HCV test? Physical image shape sounds like something you'd need EM to do. What's stopping people from tagging virus particle with fluorescent antibodies and then counting the green dots with a light microscope? No software patent needed to count dots.

      --
      soylentnews.org
  11. Re:attaching lenses to camera produces microscope. by YoungManKlaus · · Score: 1

    full ack ... just because you use a smartphone instead of a built-in image sensor does not make stuff groundbreaking ... it just removes parts which everyone has already in his pocket anyhow.

    Actually: this system is already in use at least for a bunch of telescopes where you can easily screw on your camera for taking images, and I imagine it is no different with professional microscopes ... so the only thing that actually changes is the adaptor.

  12. Next "Killer" App by az1324 · · Score: 1

    Introducing... Instagerm

  13. Re: attaching lenses to camera produces microscope by umafuckit · · Score: 1

    Building a fluorescence microscope is easy. It's day two or any three of a beginners imaging course.

    --
    soylentnews.org
  14. Copycat by miniskunk · · Score: 0

    It looks like they are trying to steal the idea of this kickstarter. He has proposed the exact same thing and will be shipping out inexpensive15X lenses(up to 60X if the phone has optical zoom) next month and is currently working on even more powerful 150X lens attachment. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/968523355/micro-phone-lens-cell-phone-based-microscope

    1. Re:Copycat by miniskunk · · Score: 0

      Since slashdot doesn't allow editing once posted, I want to clarify this kickstarter is using a less complicated and expensive approach. It is not quite fully copycatting his product, but the general idea is the same. I am sure many others have thought of this before.

  15. Patent opportunity by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    First we had "Patent X"
    then we had "Patent X using a computer"
    then we had "Patent X using the internet"
    now we could have "Patent X using a smartphone"

  16. Word Processor and Reader for Microsoft Office. by mustafawi · · Score: 1

    Word Processor and Reader for Microsoft Office. By Irfan Farooqi IPhone and IPad Lightweight office work on the go Backup of documents Quick access to Documents, Spread sheets, Presentations, notes and memos word processing Pocket Spreadsheet Pocket Presentation Download : https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/documents-word-processor-reader/id642314248?mt=8

  17. Word Processor and Reader for Microsoft Office. by mustafawi · · Score: 1

    Word Processor and Reader for Microsoft Office. By Irfan Farooqi IPhone and IPad Lightweight office work on the go Backup of documents Quick access to Documents, Spread sheets, Presentations, notes and memos word processing Pocket Spreadsheet Pocket Presentation Download : https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/documents-word-processor-reader/id642314248?mt=8