Cellscope loa: How it helps to detect blood borne parasites in central Africa

In this digital era, everyone knows how to capture an image or shoot a video with a smartphone. But with integration of low cost optical components and custom developed video processing algorithm a researcher team led by prof. Daniel A. Fletcher from University of Berkeley has developed "Cellscope loa"; a miniaturized microscope with in-filed disease diagnosis ability. As reported in the published research article in the highly acclaimed journal,  Science Transnational Medicine;  the detection process is based on the wriggling motion of the live blood borne parasites. 

The developed video microscope  detects this wriggling motion of the parasite and quantifies there presence with the in-built video processing with the smartphone. With rapid 3D printing technology the cost of the device can significantly be reduced when manufactured in mass scale. The researcher has tested the performance of the video microscope in the loa-endemic regions of central Africa and good correlation has been found with time consuming laboratory confined manual thick smear count. 

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The existing method for detection and quantification of blood borne parasites is a time consuming process due to manual counting and is not suitable for point-of-care diagnosis. Cellscope loa is now used for 40,000 people in Cameron, Africa. The new invention can be adopted by most of the rural and remote location of India where proper medical diagnostic facility is not available.  

Now cost effective blood analysis can be possible with your smartphone

Around the world people from rural and remote areas are facing serious health risks due to the unavailability of proper diagnosis facility this is due to the requirement of sophisticated analytical tools and needed scientific expertise [1]. But the good news is that,  in most of the places you can find a smartphone. According to International TelecommunicationUnion (ITU), there are almost 7 Billion people around the world that is 95% of the world population is connected by mobile-cellular network facility till 2016.  People from any financial background can posses a smartphone due to its affordable cost and ease to operation. In India any place, rural or urban you can possibly find an smartphone [2]. A smartphone can be operated by anyone irrespective of any scientific knowledge due to its user friendly interface and less technicality. 

A research group, under the guidance of Prof. Aydogan Ozcan of University of California, Los Angeles has developed a cost effective blood analysis platform within the smartphone using its cmos camera [3]. The developed imaging platform on the smartphone can be used to estimate white and red blood cell concentration. The same device can also be used to determine hemoglobin concentration in a patient blood sample.  The custom developed android application quantifies the the number of blood cells in the sample from the captures photograph using in-built image processing algorithm. The hemoglobin concentration has been determined with the light absorption principle.  

The results obtained from the smartphone blood analyzer were compared with the laboratory grade standard blood quality assessing tool Sysmex KN21 hematology analyzer and good correlation has been found as reported in their research findings in a peer reviewed journal. Moreover, the test results can be saved to the phone itself and can be shared with the patient instantly.

With simple blood sample preparation and cost-effective instrumentation, in future this type of smartphone based innovations can significantly help the deprived community around the world who are suffering from serious health risks.

1.http://www.hindustantimes.com/photos/india-news/world-health-day-6-common-issues-afflicting-india/photo-Pm5xrcka4pxju68wOqFeKP.html

2.http://www.dailymail.co.uk/indiahome/indianews/article-3681418/Mobiles-mobility-key-rural-India-villagers-spend-smartphones-cars-ever.html

3.http://pubs.rsc.org/is/content/articlehtml/2013/lc/c3lc41408f

Smartphone as a photometric sensor for detection of fluoride content in drinking water

Presence of chemical contaminant such as fluoride is a major concern for human health due to the risk of serious health issues such as dental and skeletal fluororis. People from many parts of India even in our North-East are suffering from serious health hazards by unknowingly drinking fluoride content water. Since, this chemicals does not create any physical coloration to water, no efforts has been made for removal. Detection of such chemicals required costly lab-confined spectrophotometer which costs in lakhs. Although visual detection of such chemicals is possible with colorimteric test kits but the problem is that it can't exactly quantify the exact amount of the fluoride content. For exact quantification we need costly laboratory grade tools and requires people with scientific expertise.

As mentioned in the previous posts smartphone finds its applicability in many of the scientific ventures. We have recently demonstrated in a peer reviewed journal (click for more information)the use of smartphone as a photometric sensor for in-field detection of chemical contaminants in drinking water. For example we have considered detection of fluoride in water. The same sensor can be used for all absorption based detection methods. We have used the ambient light sensor of the phone as a light intensity detector and developed the required android app using MIT App inventor cloud based software for rapid computation within the phone.

Still both scientific and computational optimization requires which will be done in the due course of time. the developed sensor can find its usability as a ultra low cost photometer in monitoring water quality parameters in remote and resource poor regions of our country. 

Microscope without lens: Chip-scale microscope with a smartphone

Remove the lens module of your smartphone camera and make it a microscope. A research group from Biophotonics Laboratory at Caltech developed a smartphone microscope without using any lens. The imaging platform is based on the contact imaging or shadow imaging with the power of rigorous image processing capability of the smartphone. 

   

As reported in their research article in the highly acclaimed journal "Lab on a Chip" from royal society of chemistry (Click for more information) the microscope can image blood smears. The chip-scale microscope is demonstrated to image various micron size algae in a pond in the above video.   This work proves the remark "a smartphone can do lots of things besides just clicking a shot".   Please subscribe for more updates...

Cellphone microscope: A microscope that fits to your pocket

We always get fascinated with the beautiful structural life  of the micro-world because the Gods creation looks more beautiful in the sub-micron dimensions. A usual bamboo leaf looks more beautiful with its microscopic structural pattern. Moreover, the sub-microscopic investigation plays a vital role in human health.

Wikimedia commons: By Graeme Bartlett - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0

But most of us are unable to visualize this fascinating unknown world due to requirement of microscopic imaging devices such as a light microscope. Due to its high cost it can't be affordable by individual even a laboratory with low resource settings. 

Wikimedia commons- Center for Biofilm Research, Montana State University, CC BY-SA 4.0

App Inventor Tutorials 1: How to use backpack to copy block codes from project to project

This tutorial shows how you can copy your block codes to the backpack in the app inventor interface and use these codes in an another project or screen.