Science and Curiosity

 Paperfuge is an assemblage of paper and strings. Inspired by the design of millenia-old toy, Paperfuge is a handpowered centrifuge that can spin biological samples at thousands of revolutions per minute (rpm). But unlike a centrifuge, Paperfuge does not require electricity, complicated machinery, maintenance or even money to operate. Paperfuge is an ultra-low cost human powered centrifuge. " There are a billion people on this planet who live with no electricity, no infrastructure, no roads and they have the same kind of health care needs that you and I have " Manu Prakash says, whose lab at Stanford developed centrifuge with these people in mind.  Paperfuge can whip blood into circles at up to 125,00 rpm, which is enough to separate plasma from the blood sample in just 90 seconds. Paperfuge produces a force of 30,000 Gs. Manu Prakash says, " To the best of my knowledge it's the fastest spinning object by human power " A centrifuge is critical for detecting dise...

 Foldscope is an ultra-affordable paper microscope which can be folded with a sheet of paper.  Foldscope is created with a vision to solve the accessibility problem in Science. It is designed to be portable and durable while performing on par with conventional research microscopes ( 140X magnification and 2 micron resolution ). Foldscope which began as a simple idea has now grown into a company that provides low cost tools to communities around the world to discover the world around and interpret it their own way.  A foldscope is an optical microscope that can be assembled using simple components like sheet of papers and lens. It is developed by Manu Prakash and designed to cost less than US$1 to build. It is the part of the frugal science movement which aims to make cheap and easy tools available for scientific use in the developing world. The mission is to break down the price barrier between people and the curiosity and the excitement of scientific exploration! With t...

 Science is not just about knowing but also about experiencing.  Today with the boon of technological advancement we have easy access to information and knowledge which is merely a click away. Science is largely about learning and it comes through the experience. So, it's more important how you can make the experience of science more accessible to a lot of people around the world.  The actual experience of science is utilizing scientific tools to make your own discoveries. Prof. Manu Prakash at Stanford University is in a quest of how can we make scientific tools that are so affordable, which are like buying a pencil from a shop, So what it would mean if a scientific tool is as accessible as pencil? What you would actually do, would you sketch with it or would you write a poetry with it, what exactly is the end of that for science? Prakash Lab do this in different fields but mainly focusing on the microscopic world. So how do you make the microscopic world easily visible,...