Google Maps helps us visualize any city in the world in seconds. Its technology also allows us to explore the lunar surface, and the great goal that is Mars. However, at the University of New South Wales they do not plan to use Google Maps to go to space, but rather into the interior of the human body. The idea is to study tissue at the cellular level with very high resolution images, and observe the progress of certain conditions such as arthrosis and osteoporosis.
One of the most interesting aspects of technological development is when applications are discovered that completely surpass the original concept. The number of examples is immense, and the world of computing does not escape that list. Even the ancestors of the Internet itself took their first steps as projects with military and governmental objectives in mind. And so we arrive at Google Maps. Its name confirms beyond any doubt what its main function is, but the Mountain View giant has created during the evolutionary process of this tool some resources applicable in completely unrelated fields, starting with medicine. What do maps have to do with health? This video from the University of New South Wales explains it.
A digital map of the human body
A group of experts has decided to implement a mechanism similar to that used in obtaining satellite images to create a digital map of the human body at the cellular level. Melissa Knothe Tate, engineer, biologist and project leader, mentions that with this system doctors will be able to evaluate an area of the body (in the video, the example is the knee), from the outside to one of its cells, and observe how it receives nutrients. As a test, the researchers took images of the hip bone using a scanning electron microscope, compiled several terabytes of data and subjected them to Google's algorithms to create a partial map. What would previously have required studies for more than 25 years can now be reduced to a couple of weeks.
A vital tool for medicine
This Google Maps of the Human Body can become a vital system for preventing diseases and developing more efficient treatments. Many conditions begin with damage to a single cell, and the passage of time does the rest of the work. One of the objectives of Knothe Tate and her team is to investigate new treatments for osteoarthritis of the hip, a serious condition that affects millions of adults, causing pain and loss of mobility in the most severe cases. Would you like to see a demo of the map? The link is below.
