Researchers at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering, in collaboration with the Department of Biology at Barnard College, have developed a mobile-phone microscope that enables rapid and automated detection of Nosema spores in honey bees in field settings. This mobile and cost-effective platform, weighing only 0.8 pounds, is composed of a smartphone based fluorescence microscope, a custom-developed smartphone application and an easy to perform sample preparation protocol that enables fluorescence tagging of bee parasite spores even in the field.

Aydogan Ozcan, UCLA Chancellorís Professor of Electrical and Computer Engin