smartphone tagged posts

This is an example of SegNet in action: the separate components of the road scene are all labelled in real time. Credit: Alex Kendall

New smartphone-based system could accelerate development of driverless cars. 2 newly-developed systems for driverless cars can identify a user’s location and orientation in places where GPS does not function, and identify the various components of a road scene in real time on a regular camera or smartphone, performing the same job as sensors costing tens of thousands of pounds.

Although the systems cannot currently control a driverless car, the ability to make a machine ‘see’ and accurately identify where it is and what it’s looking at is a vital part of developing autonomous vehicles and robotics...

David Bello, M.D., listens to the heart of a patient at Orlando Health using a new device called HeartBuds, a smartphone and an app. Credit: Orlando Health

“They not only detect sounds inside the body just as well – or better – than traditional stethoscopes, but they are more sanitary,” said David Bello, MD, developer of HeartBuds. “And because they incorporate smartphone technology, we can now record, store and share those sounds as well. This could change the way we approach patient exams in the future.”

The stethoscope was invented in 1816 by French physician René Laennec, and has essentially been unchanged since. But on the eve of its 200th anniversary, the emergence of this new technology could mark the beginning of the end for this medical mainstay.

With HeartBuds, doctors use a sma...