My advisor, Dr. Rich Fletcher, and I began our investigation of pulmonary diseases last fall. We learned that these diseases are significant causes of morbidity and mortality and the burden is mostly focused on the developing world. However, the standard techniques for diagnosing these diseases require expensive machines and well-trained technicians, both of which can be lacking in resource-poor settings. As a result, patients are misdiagnosed and do not receive the treatment they need. Rich and I realized that if we combined our skillsets (Dr. Fletcher is an expert in developing low-cost sensors that interface with mobile phones and I am a machine learning researcher interested in developing diagnostic tools), we could develop an inexpensive, portable diagnostic tool kit that could help doctors and health workers provide more accurate diagnoses of pulmonary diseases. More →