Octopi, Open (?) microscope able to process 1.5M red blood cells/min

<p> When researching about <a class="wikilink" href="/open_hardware/"> open hardware </a> projects to get inspiration for the <a class="wikilink" href="/small_scope/"> Small Scope </a> , found an interesting one called Octopi <sup id="fnref:1"> <a class="footnote-ref" href="#fn:1"> 1 </a> </sup> , by <a class="wikilink" href="/prakash_lab/"> Prakash Lab </a> , the same guy behind the <a class="wikilink" href="/foldscope/"> foldscope </a> <sup id="fnref:2"> <a class="footnote-ref" href="#fn:2"> 2 </a> </sup> . Something they did very nicely is the press release. If you just Google around, you'll find a lot of coverage. </p> <h2> Objectives of Octopi </h2> <p> They identify a great need for tools to do <a class="wikilink" href="/malaria/"> malaria </a> diagnosis, which currently rely on microscopy imaging and manual analysis. This creates a great bottleneck, since technicians able to do the study and hardware is not easy to find in some countries. </p> <p> Octopi can overcome these limitations by automating the image analysis, and by lowering the costs of the microscope itself. <a class="wikilink" href="/malaria/"> Malaria </a> is one of those diseases that affect under developed countries and get relatively little attention from central economies (we are talking hundreds of thousands of deaths per year). </p> <p> I have also seen a <a class="wikilink" href="/spectrometer/"> spectrometer </a> from <a class="wikilink" href="/armani_lab/"> Armani Lab </a> that targets the same problems. </p> <h2> Ideas behind Octopi </h2> <p> Simple microscope with a stage that can scan large areas and auto-focus. In this way it is possible to image large areas of a smear of <a class="wikilink" href="/blood/"> blood </a> . A piezo focuses on the microscope slide and two stepper motors move the sample in XY. A <a class="wikilink" href="/jetson_nano/"> Jetson Nano </a> powers the pattern recognition software that identifies red blood cells. There is also a laser for fluorescent imaging, and in principle a filter </p> <h2> Limitations of Octopi </h2> <p> It is very badly documented. It is hard to know what hardware is actually used. A lot of components are sourced from Aliexpress, which means they come and go out of stock and it is very hard to buy the exact same components. </p> <div class="footnote"> <hr/> <ol> <li id="fn:1"> <p> https://doi.org/10.1101/684423 <a class="footnote-backref" href="#fnref:1" title="Jump back to footnote 1 in the text"> ↩ </a> </p> </li> <li id="fn:2"> <p> https://www.foldscope.com/ <a class="footnote-backref" href="#fnref:2" title="Jump back to footnote 2 in the text"> ↩ </a> </p> </li> </ol> </div>