Now, barcode scanner microscope for better disease imaging

February 23, 2017

Melbourne, Feb 23: Australian engineers have developed an advanced microscope using barcode laser scanner technology that may help doctors better analyse complex medical conditions ranging from blood disorders and cancer to neurological disorders.

The microscope can film moving blood cells and neurons firing in living animals and is much more powerful than similar microscopes available commercially.

barcode1"Scientists can use our new microscope to analyse complex medical problems ranging from blood disorders and cancer to neurological disorders," said lead researcher, Steve Lee from Australian National University (ANU).

"The microscope can speed up or slow down to capture the slow moving cells in a blood stream or live neurons firing rapidly in the brain, making it much more flexible than other microscopes on the market," said Lee.

Lee said the microscope used technology similar to retail barcode scanners and office laser printers.

In barcode scanners, a laser beam bounces off a spinning polygon mirror, allowing it to scan across a sample very quickly.

A barcode scanner registers a sequence of patterns to identify a product. A polygon mirror usually has around 10 mirror facets.

Lee said the team's microscope used a more powerful laser beam as the light source and up to 36 mirror facets to scan the laser beam across the biological sample in a few thousandths of a second.

"We achieve the same imaging resolution of conventional scanning microscopes on the market but at double the speed," he said.

"The innovation here is that we modernised the polygon mirror microscopy system with advanced electronics and software controls to enable real-time imaging applications, with up to 800 frames per second," Lee added.

Yongxiao Li, a PhD student from the ANU Research School of Engineering, said the customised open-source software made the microscope a flexible imaging tool.

The research was published in the Journal of Biophotonics.

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News Network
May 6,2020

Hyderabad, May 6: Away from city lights, two hours before Sunrise, people in India and across the world can witness Annual Meteor Shower called Eta Aquarids till May 28.

Observed since time immemorial, Meteor shower are commonly known as shooting stars which are nothing but dust flakes of comet/asteroid entering earth atmosphere.

This Annual Eta Aquarids Meteor Shower peaked on Wednesday at 02.30 am on Wednesday whereas presence of Full Moon was an obstacle outshining bright streaks of lights of this meteor shower zipping across the South Eastern sky.

As this meteor shower is active till May 28, people can still watch this celestial spectacle in early morning every day, Planetary Society of India (PSI) Director N Sri Raghunandan Kumar interacting with UNI said.

As per International Meteor Organization (IMO), 50 meteors per hour are expected to be seen on day of peak today. And this number would vary as days pass on till May 28 while earth passes through dust cloud of comet debris in its orbit.

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Agencies
July 2,2020

Paris, Jul 2: Several interacting exoplanets have already been spotted by satellites. But a new breakthrough has been achieved with, for the first time, the detection directly from the ground of an extrasolar system of this type.

An international collaboration including CNRS researchers has discovered an unusual planetary system, dubbed WASP-148, using the French instrument SOPHIE at the Observatoire de Haute-Provence (CNRS/Aix-Marseille Universite).

The scientists analysed the star's motion and concluded that it hosted two planets, WASP-148b and WASP-148c. The observations showed that the two planets were strongly interacting, which was confirmed from other data.

Whereas the first planet, WASP-148b, orbits its star in nearly nine days, the second one, WASP-148c, takes four times longer. This ratio between the orbital periods implies that the WASP-148 system is close to resonance, meaning that there is enhanced gravitational interaction between the two planets. And it turns out that the astronomers did indeed detect variations in the orbital periods of the planets.

While a single planet, uninfluenced by a second one, would move with a constant period, WASP-148b and WASP-148c undergo acceleration and deceleration that provides evidence of their interaction.

The study will shortly be published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

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Agencies
January 4,2020

Washington D.C: One of the greatest spectacles of modern art is still thriving in the Australian outback as confirmed by satellite imagery of NASA. The Marree Man is a massive geoglyph depicting an aboriginal hunter, that spans over 2.6 miles in the Southern Australian region.

Discovered by a pilot in 1998, its origin still remains a mystery even to this date.

The Marree Man was given a new lease of life in 2016 when a group of people from the neighboring town of Marree plowed its lines to avert its fading due to erosion.

After NASA shared the image of the art-work that was taken in June, the efforts of the good samaritans turned out to be a total success, reported CNN Travel.

The restoration team believes that the refurbished Marree Man would last longer than its original version.

According to NASA, "They [the team] created wind grooves, designed to trap water and encourage the growth of vegetation. They hope that eventually, the man will turn green."

In a previous article, CNN reported that an entrepreneur by the name of Dick Smith took upon himself to unravel the geoglyph's mystery in 2016. His team combed through all the available evidence but couldn't find anything conclusive.

In 2018 he even offered a 5,000 Australian dollar reward for anyone who knows the identity of its creator.

Nobody turned up with an answer but it was speculated that unknown artist lives in Alice Springs or even might be an American.

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