14 DAY TRIAL // Science fiction inserted lots of dreams in the heads of mankind ever since it arose as a genre, and every day the world grows closer towards turning Sci Fi into reality. Case in point, the first Tricorder has been released.
What is a tricorder, you may ask? If you're a Star trek fan, you probably already know the answer: a medical scanner used by Star Trek doctors. The scanner analyzes patients without having to stick them with needles or probes.
Until this week, tricorders were just another thing from science fiction. Now, though, they're real, even if the one that Scanadu made isn't as advanced as the concept that inspired it.
Not that it's such a shock. Electron microscopes, CT and X-ray scanners have a hard enough time gleaming cellular and microscopic information about our bodies.
There's no way a tiny item like the tricorder could get all that information like in the fictional series, and definitely not without harmful radiation.
That's okay though. Baby steps aren't a bad thing, and it's not like the tricorder is handicapped or anything. Just because it can't do everything the fictional thing did doesn't mean it doesn't have its uses.
In fact, the Scanadu Scout can accomplish quite a few tasks, like reading temperature, scanning heart rate, determining the breathing rate, reading the systolic and diastolic blood pressure. You can even determine emotional stress and blood oxygenation.
So you could argue that the term “tricorder” isn't altogether accurate, because the item doesn't just do three things. All the information is determined by bringing the tricorder near the forehead.
A 3D printer from Solid Concepts was used to help build the working prototype, just like the crew of the Star Trek Enterprise used the Replicator to create basically anything out of compressed energy.
Obviously, doing that and re-aligning molecules in moments is still way beyond our world as it is today. 3D printing is, thus, the next best thing, and Solid Concepts is right on top of that. And so, we suppose, is Stratasys, since it bought Solid Concepts not long ago. But we digress.
Thus, the Scanadu Scout was built with Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) 3D printing. The case is made of ABS thermoplastic material, and has a gleaming finish. Several prototypes were made before finally deciding on this design though, with a round shape and milky white coloring.
Scanadu is a startup company funded by Walter De Brouwer and is participating in the Qualcomm Tricorder X Prize competition, which promises to grant $10 million / €7.23 million to whomever invents the best health scanner.
