Low cost Webcams to monitor vital signs

Technology has always been bringing about improvements in our way of life and our heath care systems. In the future the most important tool for a doctor the stethoscope will just turn redundant.   How??
A  team at MIT media labs has come up with a very interesting system to monitor and check vital signs of a person/patient without the need of any physical contact or sensors. 

How it works?

The system works by simply putting a person in-front of a low cost camera like a webcam and gives exact and accurate information about pulse rate of the person.The system works through a complex video imaging system called  "Non-contact, automated cardiac pulse measurements using video imaging and blind source separation". Developed by Ming-Zher Poh, Daniel J. McDuff, and Rosalind W. Picard. 

Netra lets you tests your eyes through a mobile phone.

To get your eyes checked you have to take an appointment go visit the optometrist and then go through a series of test. All the equipment involved like an Aberrometer in the test costs a lot. Poor countries and civilizations cannot afford it and are therefore deprived from quality vision. But now the function of the Aberrometer has been shrinked to just a small lens device and a smart phone screen.

A team at MIT media labs consisting of Ankit Mohan, Manuel M. Oliveira Neto, Vitor Pamplona and Ramesh Raskar have come up with an amazing prototype device and a software which lets to detect the power of refractive errors in your eye anyplace anytime.

Courtesy gizmag.com

The whole system consists of  three things, a plastic device consisting of a lenses, a mobile phone and a software installed on the cellphone. The plastic device is clipped to the cellphone screen. Then the patient looks through the lens to see a pair of parallel  lines, now the patient has to press the arrow keys until the parallel green and red lines seem to overlap. This is repeated 8 times with different angles for each eye, the software comes up with prescription data. The devices has no moving parts and hence no maintenance. The software is based on a  technology called Bokodes which was developed last year which helps to store a large amount of information on a tiny square code.