Meet LUCAS. It’s in the running for the title of “world’s smallest microscope.”
LUCAS was assembled with only $10 worth of hardware and is completely lens-free and digital.
The microscope images shadows of cells instead of magnifying cells through the lens of a conventional microscope. It was created by Dr. Aydogan Ozcan, assistant professor of electrical engineering at UCLA, and is known to him and his fellow researchers as the “Lensless Ultra-wide field-of-view Cell monitoring Array platform based on Shadow imaging.”.
The shadows of cells, known as holograms, can be imaged and sent as picture files to a database program that interprets the images and quantifies abnormal and normal cell shadows.
Infectious diseases like tuberculosis, malaria and HIV can be diagnosed, and blood counts can be done from a distance using LUCAS, bringing hope for improved health care overseas.
The technology LUCAS uses is all digital, replacing old mechanical components with algorithms.
“It’s a digital revolution,” Ozcan said of the device he first conceptualized and worked on three to four years ago while working at Harvard Medical School.
The technology behind the device could potentially replace bulky laboratory microscopes with digital microscopy and the imaging of shadows and be used globally to make faster, more accurate and reliable diagnoses.
Ozcan’s hope is that LUCAS will be able to make such fast diagnoses that this technology will assist a country’s government in predicting and modeling the spread of a disease. They would then be able to better utilize their resources, make policies and combat the disease.
“Infectious diseases will be fought better. … In the long term, (it will) return back to more life expectancy,” he said.
The cost-effectiveness of LUCAS means it has the potential to be available everywhere to provide at-home health care, lower the costs of insurance and improve the quality of life.
“(Engineers) are always stating their own problems and solving (them). LUCAS is the solution for a real problem,” said Onur Mudanyali, a second-year graduate student.
The device has already been able to image white and red blood cells, three different lymphocytes, granulocytes, monocytes, platelets, E. coli, yeast cells and fibroblasts.
While LUCAS has produced many findings, it is still under research and Ozcan is making improvements to the algorithms and hardware.
“The professor is really smart and innovative. … As a student, we have to work very hard to catch up,” said Ting-Wei (Justin) Su, the third-year graduate student and research lab manager who helped assemble the first LUCAS at UCLA.
Ozcan’s ideas are being implemented daily to further develop this latest cell application.
“It is always a constant move with a positive slope,” he said, “Never a point of disappointment or loss of hope.”