Armed with the knowledge that in many developing countries, the number of people needing medical attention far outnumbers the facilities capable of doing so, UCLA researchers came up with LUCAS. Short for Lensless Ultra-wide-field Cell monitoring Array, LUCAS is a lens-free imaging platform (see sample image at the left) based on Shadow Imaging technique. The LUCAS system can accurately count the indicated cell types in any homogenous solution and, since LUCAS is lens-independent, it could be scaled down to the size of a microchip.

In the future, a LUCAS microchip could be embedded into cell phones that act as a portable medical diagnostic device. The research team envisages people taking blood samples on a small coin-sized chip which is then loaded onto the LUCAS-equipped phone. The system could then count and identify specific cells (red or white blood cells or bacteria, for instance) in the sample, after which the data collected is sent wirelessly to a hospital for further analysis. This is especially useful when determining blood-related illnesses such as malaria and HIV.

You can grab the full journal paper for LUCAS here.