MediTech

This post is solely dedicated to one of my friends, who is doing his MBBS and is a quite passionate about technology. So here is an article that concerns both technology and medicine.

We do see that technology has a greater inpact on medicine these days. Starting from medicine productioin to complicated surgeries without the help of technology might well prove to be very tough.One such usage that really fascinated me is CAPSULE ENDOSCOPY. As of today in many hospitals we find a normal methodology of endoscopy being followed,hich is a long, thin tube inserted into the rectum and transversed through the colon or, alternatively, through the mouth and into the stomach and small intestine as a means of mechanically-assisted visualization of these structures. It becomes very tidious task and even the patient has ro suffer a bit. But the technology i am writing about, simplifies this task and does endoscopy a simply procedure. In Capsule Endoscopy(CE) uses a small capsule sized device with a camera fitted at the apex which does the photographer's job. An intestine is usually very long(around 25-30 mtrs). As per today, no scope is available which will cover the whole of intestine. This is where techiqueof CE scores above the others. Because the capsule is swallowed and travels through the digestive system, capsule endoscopy takes a longer amount of time than traditional endoscopy. The images are of good quality, comparable to those from scopes. The test carries a high sensitivity and specificity for detecting lesions. Early research has shown that capsule endoscopy can detect evidence of disease in some cases that traditional endoscopy cannot. The technology is used by gastroenterologists to detect diseases such as Crohn's disease, gastric ulcers, and colon cancer. At the present time, the capsule camera is primarily used to visualize the small intestine. Whereas the upper gastrointestinal tract (esophagus, stomach, and duodenum) and the colon (large intestine) can be very adequately visualized with scopes. 
There are a lot of recent activities going on in this field. Ongoing research is continuing in the United States, Israel, Japan, South Korea, and United Kingdom to improve capsule endoscope technology. Sayaka Capsule by RF System of Japan is an advanced capsule with power supplied wirelessly from an external source. In Japan, capsule endoscopy is now approved for use in the small bowel and in Europe, capsule endoscopy is being used for several areas including colon screening since July 2007. The next major development is to enable the capsule to do other functions that are possible with current traditional endoscopes, besides just imaging with a camera. These include multiple therapeutic and diagnostic operations such as ultrasound, electrocautery, biopsy, laser, and heat with a retractable arm.

Let us hope that this technology develops soon.........

New Programming Language - GO

High rate of development in Computer hardware and application but no significant changes in programming techniques became the reason for google to develop a new programming language GO. It was released on Nov 10 and  serves a the task that a C and C++ programming languages do today and has its speed almost same as that of a C/C++ compiler. The best of GO is that it supports instant compilation. It feels like we are using an interactive programming language. The users of ".net" might be well aware with the advantages on instantaneous and interactive programming.Google developed this programming language under a group 20% project( Google workers can constructively utilize 20% of their work time for developmental works other than their normal routine official work) nearly 2 years before this date. Since there is no IDE as per now for GO programming, Google has decided to market GO as an OpenSource hoping the open source community would come up with better tools for this language. Pike, Robert Griesemer, Ken Thompson, Ian Taylor, and Russ Cox, all being Google engineers are the top contributers for the outcome of this highly effective programming language. The learning curve of this new programming language is compared to that of JAVA. Pike, one of the developers feels that if people can learn JAVA out of the box, they wont find and difficulty in learning GO. GO though not seen in development of any major Web applications at present, it is known from google employees that Go has played an important role in many internal developments of GOOGLE. For example GOOGLE WAVE can provide an enhanced performance if both Front and Back end is designed using Go, instead of the present combination of JAVASCRIPT and C++ sever code. Pike also revels that Go has an important role to play in the forth coming OS Google Chrome. 

Google engineers are seeing it as a future tool of programming, but whether a programmer can come out of the adjusted C/C++ coding is yet to be seen.

Wings of Flight for technology- Robotic fly

Robot technology has been on fast improvement from past 5 years. Robots have now evolved to such a stage wherein they can almost function like a human being with an exception of thinking power. Their application is widely seen in many fields. Japan being a leader in Robotic technology has taken robots to all most all fields ranging from sheer gaming to even aid in security concern of the the country. And i would like to focus on the Robotics being applied in security concerns.

With increase in implementation of technology by the anti social groups, the efforts to strengthen security with the usage of the same technology has also increased. And one such effort reminds me of the ROBOTIC fly. The credit goes to to HARVARD university for giving machinery a wing to fly. Though this fly still is in its nest, the day it becomes widely used can be a real

gift to spies all round the globe. This Robotic fly is a very small machinery with a weight of about just 50 - 60 milligrams, resembles a small house fly that is a common sight in almost all homes. The new robotic fly being developed by unnameable organization has such complex circuit designing that it becomes very difficult to trace it even by complex detectors. This house fly has an embedded camera with a a reasonably good lens, such that the person in picture can be easily identified and a very sharp response for even low frequency sounds. Having chemical sensors, this fly is now being used for Chemical testing. The main issue of concern in this technology is its power support. Since the size of the fly is exceptionally small, usage of conventional power supply source becomes very difficult. Solar technology can be implemented, but its credibility of functioning at night time comes into questioning. So now the scientists have been working on the idea of conversion of heat energy into electrical energy at a micro scale such that the robotic fly can recharge itself by going near a bulb or any other electronic equipment in the room of its functioning. If this technology is well developed, this can really act as a boom for all the security personals around the world.
But even proper care has to be taken such that this effective tool only remains in safe hands.Or else friends ,in coming years if you have any ideas of mischief to be done, then you would have to search your house well for all the flies.....