A team of researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara has claimed to have invented a new way to test Covid using a smartphone camera. Preliminary tests indicate that this method is as effective as the PCR test. Researchers have named this method Smartlamp.
This new method is commonly used in the laboratory but can be diagnosed using some of the most readily available and affordable instruments and your own smartphone.
According to a research report published in the JAMA Network Open, the new Covid test method will come in handy for people who are taking the test at a cost of $7, living in a remote area or living alone away from the population.
According to the technology site Senate, the Covid test in this method is quite simple. For this, first you have to download the smartphone app ‘Backticount’ created by the researchers. Then you have to put your phone on a ‘hot plate’. And the camera on the back of the phone will be at the bottom. Then you have to give saliva in the test kit placed on the ‘hot plate’. Then if you apply a ‘reactive solution’ in it, the viral RNA will become visible in the camera of the phone, you have to launch the app.
At this stage, the ‘reactive solution’ will mix with the virus, change color and become bright red. And the app will measure the presence of the virus based on how fast this color change is happening.
The Senate says that this test kit is quite cheap and easy to use. Researchers see this as a reliable way to diagnose the covid in low- and middle-income countries at low cost and in the absence of complex and costly technological capabilities.
However, preliminary research has shown positive results, but the technology is not yet ready for widespread use. Only 50 people took part in the initial study, and the smartphone app is currently only integrated with the camera of the Samsung Galaxy S9 smartphone. This process has to go through more complex scientific experiments to gain acceptance.