{"id":16008,"date":"2009-11-12T06:39:33","date_gmt":"2009-11-12T04:39:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishforum.com.tr\/en\/content\/?p=16008"},"modified":"2023-04-05T10:37:55","modified_gmt":"2023-04-05T07:37:55","slug":"far-from-a-lab-turn-a-cellphone-into-a-microscope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2009\/11\/12\/far-from-a-lab-turn-a-cellphone-into-a-microscope\/","title":{"rendered":"Far From a Lab? Turn a Cellphone Into a Microscope"},"content":{"rendered":"

Turkish-Americans in the news:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Novelties<\/p>\n

By ANNE EISENBERG<\/p>\n

Published: November 7, 2009<\/p>\n

MICROSCOPES are invaluable tools to identify blood and other cells when screening for diseases like anemia, tuberculosis and malaria. But they are also bulky and expensive.<\/p>\n

Skip to next paragraph<\/span><\/p>\n

Ozcan Research Group at U.C.L.A.<\/p>\n

An engineer at U.C.L.A. has adapted cellphones to do the work of microscopes in screening for diseases.<\/p>\n

Ozcan Research Group at U.C.L.A.<\/p>\n

The process creates holograms that can show, for example, a stained white blood cell.<\/p>\n

Now an engineer, using software that he developed and about $10 worth of off-the-shelf hardware, has adapted cellphones to substitute for microscopes.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe convert cellphones into devices that diagnose diseases,\u201d said Aydogan Ozcan<\/strong>, an assistant professor of electrical engineering and member of the California NanoSystems Institute<\/span> at the University of California<\/span>, Los Angeles, who created the devices. He has formed a company, Microskia, to commercialize the technology.<\/p>\n

The adapted phones may be used for screening in places far from hospitals, technicians or diagnostic laboratories, Dr. Ozcan<\/strong> said.<\/p>\n

In one prototype, a slide holding a finger prick of blood can be inserted over the phone\u2019s camera sensor. The sensor detects the slide\u2019s contents and sends the information wirelessly to a hospital or regional health center. For instance, the phones can detect the asymmetric shape of diseased blood cells or other abnormal cells, or note an increase of white blood cells, a sign of infection, he said.<\/p>\n

Dr. Ozcan\u2019s devices provide a simple solution to a complex problem, said Ahmet Yildiz<\/strong>, an assistant professor of physics and molecular cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley<\/span>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is an inexpensive way to eliminate a microscope and sample biological images with a basic cellphone camera instead,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you are in a place where getting to a microscope or medical facility is not straightforward, this is a really smart solution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neven Karlovac, the chief executive of Microskia in Los Angeles, said that some of the company\u2019s products would be adaptations of regular cellphones. For phones without cameras, or phones too compact to modify, the company has different designs, including a simple box with a sensing chip that can be plugged into a cellphone or laptop with a USB cord, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe idea is to commercialize this low-cost cell imaging and diagnostic platform and apply it to a number of different products,\u201d Dr. Karlovac said. The price of the devices has not been set.<\/p>\n

Dr. Ozcan\u2019s devices are compact in part because they have eliminated the central element in a microscope \u2014 its lenses \u2014 said David J. Brady, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Duke University and director of its Imaging and Spectroscopy Program.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no need for lenses in these devices because the magnification can be done electronically,\u201d he said. \u201cYou don\u2019t need optics at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

For this electronic system of magnification, inexpensive light-emitting diodes added to the basic cellphone shine their light on a sample slide placed over the phone\u2019s camera chip. Some of the light waves hit the cells suspended in the sample, scattering off the cells and interfering with the other light waves.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen the waves interfere,\u201d Dr. Brady said, \u201cthey create a pattern called a hologram.\u201d The detector in the camera records that hologram or interference pattern as a series of pixels.<\/p>\n

The holograms are rich in information, Dr. Ozcan said. \u201cWe can learn a lot in seconds,\u201d he said. \u201cWe can process the information mathematically and reconstruct images like those you would see with a microscope.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dr. Ozcan\u2019s system may someday lead to a rapid way to process blood and other samples, said Bahram Jalali, an applied physicist and professor of electrical engineering at U.C.L.A.<\/span> \u201cIt is potentially much faster than a microscope,\u201d he said. \u201cYou don\u2019t have to scan mechanically\u201d as people must with a microscope with its small field of view.<\/p>\n

\u201cInstead you capture holograms of all the cells on the slide digitally at the same time,\u201d he said, so that it\u2019s possible, for example, to see immediately the pathogens among a vast population of healthy cells. \u201cIt\u2019s a way of looking quickly for a needle in a haystack,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

THE cellphone systems may be particularly helpful in screening for malaria, said Yvonne Bryson, a professor and chief of the pediatric infectious diseases division at the David Geffen School of Medicine at U.C.L.A. She has collaborated with Dr. Ozcan on several grants. \u201cRight now you need a microscope, and you need trained people,\u201d Dr. Bryson said. \u201cBut this device would allow you to work without either in a remote area.\u201d<\/p>\n

M. Fatih Yanik, an assistant professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said, \u201cThis makes it possible for ordinary people to gather medical information in the field just by<\/p>\n

using a cellphone adapted with cheap parts.\u201d<\/p>\n

E-mail: novelties@nytimes.com.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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