12 ms·

Google is developing cancer and heart attack detector

298 points by sxp 12y ago

ripb 12y ago
I find the idea of potentially handing Google, a firm whose core model is selling ads and generalized user data, the details of my biochemical makeup quite troubling.
- arnarbi 12y ago
  Honest question: Why?
  - scrollaway 12y ago
    Those arguments aside, we're still going.
  - ripb 12y ago
    >Honest question: Why? Why should an advertising company get access to this data in the first place? What do they intend on doing with it? Selling us adverts based on a combination of our biochemical data, or the state of our health, coupled with our search terms that might indicate we have concern over one area or another? Being able to help the medical sales industry target us more efficiently? As in "X user has Y indicators in their health data, therefore they would be a prudent market to advertise Z to"?
    - arnarbi 12y ago
      Nobody is saying they should. The data is yours, and if you don't get any value from giving access to it, then don't. My question was: Assuming you get something in return (better health, or longer life, for example), what are the factors you are weighing against it? Note in particular that I'm not saying there aren't any. I'm just challenging the knee-jerk statement of "my body's bio-chemical data is super private and sensitive so nothing in the world can be worth giving access to it", without any actual argument for it.
melling 12y ago
That would pretty much cover the rest of the population, as far as getting people to wear a smart watch.
swartkrans 12y ago
The heart attack detector seems great, but I wonder about the cancer detector. It may lead to a high number of false positives resulting in unnecessary exposures to CT scans, which because it uses radiation can actually lead to cancer, and unnecessary medical procedures and expenses, and unnecessary anxiety. If they get the false positives down it would be very beneficial of course.
- toomuchtodo 12y ago
  How many CT scans must someone get before its more detrimental that having the cancer go undetected? EDIT: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/detection/CT http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/detection/CT "In addition, whole-body CT can expose people to relatively large amounts of ionizing radiation—about 12 mSv, or four times the estimated average annual dose received from natural sources of radiation. Most doctors recommend against whole-body CT for people without any signs or symptoms of disease."
  - swartkrans 12y ago
    I have read that there is no such thing as a harmless amount radiation when it comes to the dosage you get from a CT scan. Every scan increases your risk. I think my impression is that many doctors think there must already be a health problem in the patient that needs to be addressed before someone is subjected to a CT scan. That is use a CT scan when you know it will help, not when you don't know.
    - ZoFreX 12y ago
      > Every scan increases your risk That is technically true, but it's also true that every banana you eat adds to your risk. At some small percentage increase in risk, it's sensible to stop caring.
  - samuel 12y ago
    I don't know the answer to that, but I know that some people are taking full-body CT scans annually or bi-annually because of fear of cancer.
bradbeattie 12y ago
I would hope they investigate whether the ingestion of "disease-detecting nanoparticles" increases one's risk of cancer.
- aragot 12y ago
  I don't see why you're being downvoted. What about the accumulation of nanoparticles among cells, do they traverse the cell membrane? Can they cause cell withering or dysfunction, alter gene expression, hormonal balance or cause microcuts? What about when they degenerate?
- jimrandomh 12y ago
  These aren't amateurs.
  - sdrothrock 12y ago
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotchgard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotchgard This product was not made by amateurs and was on the market for about 30 years. Its key component was perfluorooctanesulfonamide, a precursor to perfluorooctane sulfonate, which lingers in the human body for five and a half years and can cause developmental delays, cancer, immune disorders, and all kinds of other things. Amateurs can exercise due diligence and professionals can miss things.
6stringmerc 12y ago
Honest and serious question: Will this compete or compliment the notion that using canines in the cancer / disease detection process is an avenue for further study? Re: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/09/10/training-dogs-to-sniff-out-cancer/ http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/09/10/training-dogs-to-sn...
- crpatino 12y ago
  Most likely compete. Google excels at organizing information by means of symbolic processing/manipulation. Dog "know-how" is opaque enough to mix well with existing expertise. Unless they go meta and get in the dog training business, effectively using dogs as black box components in their wider system.
EZ-E 12y ago
Why do Apple, Google and major IT companies seem so much interested by our health suddenly ? What are they planning to do with the data ? Just selling it ? (life insurance companies ?)
- benologist 12y ago
  They want to be gatekeepers for services every single person needs their entire lives.
- wutbrodo 12y ago
  Tech companies these days have such massive cash hoards and low costs of borrowing: It's inevitable that any market with potential (or less cynically, any big problem that has the potential to do a lot of good) would be attractive. Healthcare in particular is a Big Problem that can be attacked from many, many angles, and technology has a role to play in all of them (perhaps more than most other fields, since healthcare is notoriously slow to adopt technology/change[1]). [1] To be fair, this is in part due to a culture of conservatism which has served the field well in general.
- swamp40 12y ago
  Why not? Would you prefer another SnapChat? These are important, world-changing unsolved problems.
- youssifa 12y ago
  For the same reasons that a healthcare startup is willing to take on arguably more risk and longer lead times to sales compared to any other industry -- there's so much human impact that can be made (and money at stake) that even a small dent in the healthcare space represents thousands of lives (and billions of dollars). A company like Google or Apple can make more than just a small dent. From a macro perspective, the US has an aging population with the Baby Boomer generation entering older adulthood. Older population = greater health needs. Financially, it makes a lot of sense for a large company with vast resources like Google or Apple to make a splash in healthcare. And now's the time to do it. They also have a distinct advantage over startups when it comes to introducing change from outside the healthcare industry. They can withstand the long sales cycle that it takes to get approvals without needing to balance fundraising in the process. Not to mention their unique ability to reduce the length of those sales cycles. They're more likely to win pilots and scale, and faster, because of their brand recognition -- a key competitive advantage when you're talking about a risk averse space like the healthcare industry. Not to mention, you typically need to get a lot of stakeholders together (providers, payers, patients) and align incentives in order to get anywhere. Large companies have a huge advantage here and can influence change relatively quickly. Healthcare institutions are constantly discussing the need for technological disruption (and have the budget / financial incentives to foot it), but by nature they are highly risk averse to any major changes. Large tech companies are uniquely positioned. SOURCE: I once worked on a healthcare startup, have been through a healthcare startup incubator program, have friends who are doctors and healthcare administrators, am familiar with healthcare investor thinking, and am connected to a spectrum of healthcare startups (both successful and early stage).
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
swamp40 12y ago
Google: "We want to scan your body with our amazing new technology and possibly add 20 years to your life!" Haters: "No thanks, way too intrusive. I don't want you tracking me/selling my data/showing me ads."
- rryan 12y ago
  Seriously, why would I let an advertising company in my body?
  - arnarbi 12y ago
    Because it might add 20 years to your life?
    - sharkweek 12y ago
      All sarcasm and cynicism aside... that IS 20 years extra life for them to be showing a warm body advertisements
      - spydum 12y ago
        So google is trying to keep us alive longer to generate more revenue! Should we be offended or flattered?
        eclipxe 12y ago
        Win-win all around
        owyn 12y ago
        Interesting question: what is the lifetime value of a person who uses a search engine to a company like Google? Looks like about $180 per year at the moment: http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2014/06/ad_revenue_per_user_google_facebook_twitter.php http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2014/0...
  - 12y ago
brightdream 12y ago
Google is uniquely positioned with the amount of data it has to uncover strong correlations between behavior and disease.
darkstar999 12y ago
Google is developing cancer [long inhale] and heart attack detector
loopasam 12y ago
Nano-bubbles and particles have been used since a long time to diagnose diseases and enhance the quality of ultrasound analysis (contrast agents). You can also link an antibody on their surface to target them against a particular protein or reveal a zone of interest (e.g. a tumor revealed by a specific biomarker). Nano-bubbles are even use to destroy adjacent tissue on purpose (sonoporation). Usually such particles are constructed via a mix of lipids and have a very short life time in the blood stream. I wonder how they're going to keep them alive in the blood stream for what seems to be a very long time and their design regarding toxicity.
steven 12y ago
I had the opportunity to speak to the head of this project Andrew Conrad at length. https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tricorder-12e1822e5e6a https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tric... What struck me was his optimism that this was really going to happen. Usually researchers are ultra cautious about going out on a limb like that (Yes, he said there was much to do, but read the interview to get his tone.) I think that comes from working at a place like Google X that encourages the big reach.
- drcode 12y ago
  I think many people who have been seriously involved in medicine will tell you that there's many low hanging fruit in medicine that are being missed because misaligned incentive structures in the health care sector- This project sounds like a possible example of this. We can only hope that a few well-capitalized companies like Google can have the vision to see these low hanging fruit, and will be able to bear the near-term risks and costs and take some difficult steps to reap some significant profits over a longer term.
- JoeH 12y ago
  I was diagnosed with a cancerous tumor less than a year ago. It is a tumor that has been growing inside me for at least 5 years. Had it been correctly detected/diagnosed 5 years ago, it would have been an operable tumor with a high chance of a cure rate. Unfortunately, now that tumor is currently non-operable. Current cancer screening guidelines aren't sufficient and in almost all cases they utterly fail in the early detection of cancers for people under the age of 50. I applaud anyone working towards a better method for early detection!
  - mattfrommars 12y ago
    Stay strong. I use your application as well, rescuetimer. I really like the logging it does. Can you tell me if it is written in C++ or is it mostly and mixed with other languages as well?
  - kendalk 12y ago
    I am so sorry to hear that! My mother, also, was found with a tumor that we didn't know about for a long time. She fought as long as she could. She never gave up hope. Doctors don't know everything. There are ways to fight, even natural ones. Fighting with anything is better than giving up. Hope is very powerful. Don't give up. Keep fighting. Best wishes to you from one who has walked this road with another.
millstone 12y ago
This sounds great and I hope they're successful. That said, what's the point of pre-announcing stuff like this, when it's at such an early stage? Is it just goodwill?
- munificent 12y ago
  From this article[1]: There’s still a million crazy things that happen with people, and there’s a long journey to put medicines into people, and it has to be done in the open because we’re going to do experiments— people will be wearing these devices at our Baseline Study. And: Yeah. That’s part of the reason we had to talk about this. There’s a pretty substantial body of patents that describe what we’re talking about in great detail that will be publicly noticeable in the next month or so. [1]: https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tricorder-12e1822e5e6a https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tric...
brianstorms 12y ago
World's largest advertising company developing cancer and heart attack detector. Think of the great AdSense and AdWords lead generation opportunities coming. It's like printing money.
- vertex-four 12y ago
  They've generally been quite good at refusing to let advertisers target on sensitive subjects. It's probably a legal minefield in most developed countries, and it'd be a PR nightmare if there were any sort of adverse effects. "We won’t associate with an individual’s cookie any audiences considered sensitive, such as those based on race, religion, sexual orientation, health, certain financial information, and others."[0] [0] https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2497941?hl=en https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2497941?hl=en
Lambdanaut 12y ago
I'm not worried about an "advertising agency" handling this project at all. Google is hardly just an ads agency anymore. They're multi-faceted. Maybe we should be concerned that they're(successfully) reaching their hands into just about every problem domain, but so far it's been good news for the consumer and they haven't done anything that I'm aware of to warrant them to be untrustworthy. That being said. Watch your diet and carb intake. Preventative measures are better than having to fix the disease at the last minute.
lovemenot 12y ago
Marketing, competition, new features, bugs, expoits, evolution. These things could go viral. Literally. A hard robots.txt equivalent cellular protocol might be needed to protect body parts from the gaze of Grey Google.
julius 12y ago
Specially trained dogs are able to sniff out stuff like cancerous cells or if a kid needs his insuline. Always wondered why we cannot build an artificial nose like that. Does anyone have any insights into this topic?
- dnautics 12y ago
  the cancer sniffing dog thing appears to be a case of Clever Hans
  - julius 12y ago
    Did some quick googling. Seems like research so far supports the claim. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canine_cancer_detection http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canine_cancer_detection Is there any research, with different results, missing from the Wikipedia page?
sk2code 12y ago
Including my mom in the last 10 years I've lost 4 female members of family to cancer. This product is revolutionary no doubt and I am very excited about it. I believe Google will face an uphill task as there are lots of things to explain to the consumer before taking this full stream. 1. Will these nano particles stay in my blood stream forever or do I have to inject them in my body periodically. What are its side effects? 2. The wristband on my hand communicating with these nano particles in someway connects back to the Google's network and now along with my emails and pics Google is tracking my health and my DNA. I mean I can turn off my phone and not use my email but I can't turn off my body. When combined with the DNA this project has the potential to provide an RFID to each and every human being. Ignore my ignorance I am not the expert here just curious about all these possibilities.
malthaus 12y ago
why are they doing that - just because they can and it's a great headline? if i were a google shareholder i'd rather have them return excess money than go on those pet / "greenwashing" projects
- zaroth 12y ago
  They say this is how they are going to run the business in the prospectus. They are fully entitled to directing their own R&D efforts.
zaroth 12y ago
I imagine "killer app" is no longer the understatement when your next wearable actually actively monitors your health like this. I think the privacy concerns can be worked out, and they shouldn't slow down the research. Seeing the headline, I thought it would be an article monitoring passive signals to calculate risk scores, so I was really happy to see biochemistry. I think Google pouring funds into this kind of research will lead to some awesome advancements. It's easy to imagine a recurring revenue stream from a device like this which adds years to your lifespan. Owning a device like that actually reduces the cost of your life/disability insurance because anything that does go wrong gets discovered earlier with better outcomes. Actually, you could pay for the device out of those savings alone. It is amazing to think what the feature comparison chart for wearables in the next decade will look like.
cpuguy83 12y ago
Hmm... Anyone seen the show "Continuum"? You should. It's on Netflix. And would instantly raise some red flags for this.
Shivetya 12y ago
Reading the story all I can think of is the possibilities. Suspend the particles into and disperse with aerosol in public places and then scan for indicators you want as they walk through or by detectors. You could set it all up to report to individuals anonymously, but the idea of what a future of health care might be should include a system which requires no action on the patients. The privacy concerns could be immense or moot, but many would trade for the convenience
taf2 12y ago
Sounds pretty elaborate - perhaps if we could just work on a lower cost almost do it yourself access to an MRI or ultrasound detection as well as many other troubles in the body could be detected... But this is health care 7 billion opinions very few solutions beyond reducing pain and cutting stuff
quietriot 12y ago
Google is a developing cancer and heart attack...
reality_czech 12y ago
I read this as "cancer and heart attack deflector," and it seemed a lot more awesome than it really is. Oh well.

298 points by sxp 12y ago

ripb 12y ago

I find the idea of potentially handing Google, a firm whose core model is selling ads and generalized user data, the details of my biochemical makeup quite troubling.

arnarbi 12y ago
Honest question: Why?
- scrollaway 12y ago
  Those arguments aside, we're still going.
- ripb 12y ago
  >Honest question: Why? Why should an advertising company get access to this data in the first place? What do they intend on doing with it? Selling us adverts based on a combination of our biochemical data, or the state of our health, coupled with our search terms that might indicate we have concern over one area or another? Being able to help the medical sales industry target us more efficiently? As in "X user has Y indicators in their health data, therefore they would be a prudent market to advertise Z to"?
  - arnarbi 12y ago
    Nobody is saying they should. The data is yours, and if you don't get any value from giving access to it, then don't. My question was: Assuming you get something in return (better health, or longer life, for example), what are the factors you are weighing against it? Note in particular that I'm not saying there aren't any. I'm just challenging the knee-jerk statement of "my body's bio-chemical data is super private and sensitive so nothing in the world can be worth giving access to it", without any actual argument for it.

melling 12y ago

That would pretty much cover the rest of the population, as far as getting people to wear a smart watch.

swartkrans 12y ago

The heart attack detector seems great, but I wonder about the cancer detector. It may lead to a high number of false positives resulting in unnecessary exposures to CT scans, which because it uses radiation can actually lead to cancer, and unnecessary medical procedures and expenses, and unnecessary anxiety. If they get the false positives down it would be very beneficial of course.

toomuchtodo 12y ago
How many CT scans must someone get before its more detrimental that having the cancer go undetected? EDIT: http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/detection/CT http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/detection/CT "In addition, whole-body CT can expose people to relatively large amounts of ionizing radiation—about 12 mSv, or four times the estimated average annual dose received from natural sources of radiation. Most doctors recommend against whole-body CT for people without any signs or symptoms of disease."
- swartkrans 12y ago
  I have read that there is no such thing as a harmless amount radiation when it comes to the dosage you get from a CT scan. Every scan increases your risk. I think my impression is that many doctors think there must already be a health problem in the patient that needs to be addressed before someone is subjected to a CT scan. That is use a CT scan when you know it will help, not when you don't know.
  - ZoFreX 12y ago
    > Every scan increases your risk That is technically true, but it's also true that every banana you eat adds to your risk. At some small percentage increase in risk, it's sensible to stop caring.
- samuel 12y ago
  I don't know the answer to that, but I know that some people are taking full-body CT scans annually or bi-annually because of fear of cancer.

bradbeattie 12y ago

I would hope they investigate whether the ingestion of "disease-detecting nanoparticles" increases one's risk of cancer.

aragot 12y ago
I don't see why you're being downvoted. What about the accumulation of nanoparticles among cells, do they traverse the cell membrane? Can they cause cell withering or dysfunction, alter gene expression, hormonal balance or cause microcuts? What about when they degenerate?
jimrandomh 12y ago
These aren't amateurs.
- sdrothrock 12y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotchgard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotchgard This product was not made by amateurs and was on the market for about 30 years. Its key component was perfluorooctanesulfonamide, a precursor to perfluorooctane sulfonate, which lingers in the human body for five and a half years and can cause developmental delays, cancer, immune disorders, and all kinds of other things. Amateurs can exercise due diligence and professionals can miss things.

6stringmerc 12y ago

Honest and serious question: Will this compete or compliment the notion that using canines in the cancer / disease detection process is an avenue for further study? Re: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/09/10/training-dogs-to-sniff-out-cancer/ http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/09/10/training-dogs-to-sn...

crpatino 12y ago
Most likely compete. Google excels at organizing information by means of symbolic processing/manipulation. Dog "know-how" is opaque enough to mix well with existing expertise. Unless they go meta and get in the dog training business, effectively using dogs as black box components in their wider system.

EZ-E 12y ago

Why do Apple, Google and major IT companies seem so much interested by our health suddenly ? What are they planning to do with the data ? Just selling it ? (life insurance companies ?)

benologist 12y ago
They want to be gatekeepers for services every single person needs their entire lives.
wutbrodo 12y ago
Tech companies these days have such massive cash hoards and low costs of borrowing: It's inevitable that any market with potential (or less cynically, any big problem that has the potential to do a lot of good) would be attractive. Healthcare in particular is a Big Problem that can be attacked from many, many angles, and technology has a role to play in all of them (perhaps more than most other fields, since healthcare is notoriously slow to adopt technology/change[1]). [1] To be fair, this is in part due to a culture of conservatism which has served the field well in general.
swamp40 12y ago
Why not? Would you prefer another SnapChat? These are important, world-changing unsolved problems.
youssifa 12y ago
For the same reasons that a healthcare startup is willing to take on arguably more risk and longer lead times to sales compared to any other industry -- there's so much human impact that can be made (and money at stake) that even a small dent in the healthcare space represents thousands of lives (and billions of dollars). A company like Google or Apple can make more than just a small dent. From a macro perspective, the US has an aging population with the Baby Boomer generation entering older adulthood. Older population = greater health needs. Financially, it makes a lot of sense for a large company with vast resources like Google or Apple to make a splash in healthcare. And now's the time to do it. They also have a distinct advantage over startups when it comes to introducing change from outside the healthcare industry. They can withstand the long sales cycle that it takes to get approvals without needing to balance fundraising in the process. Not to mention their unique ability to reduce the length of those sales cycles. They're more likely to win pilots and scale, and faster, because of their brand recognition -- a key competitive advantage when you're talking about a risk averse space like the healthcare industry. Not to mention, you typically need to get a lot of stakeholders together (providers, payers, patients) and align incentives in order to get anywhere. Large companies have a huge advantage here and can influence change relatively quickly. Healthcare institutions are constantly discussing the need for technological disruption (and have the budget / financial incentives to foot it), but by nature they are highly risk averse to any major changes. Large tech companies are uniquely positioned. SOURCE: I once worked on a healthcare startup, have been through a healthcare startup incubator program, have friends who are doctors and healthcare administrators, am familiar with healthcare investor thinking, and am connected to a spectrum of healthcare startups (both successful and early stage).

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

swamp40 12y ago

Google: "We want to scan your body with our amazing new technology and possibly add 20 years to your life!" Haters: "No thanks, way too intrusive. I don't want you tracking me/selling my data/showing me ads."

rryan 12y ago
Seriously, why would I let an advertising company in my body?
- arnarbi 12y ago
  Because it might add 20 years to your life?
  - sharkweek 12y ago
    All sarcasm and cynicism aside... that IS 20 years extra life for them to be showing a warm body advertisements
    - spydum 12y ago
      So google is trying to keep us alive longer to generate more revenue! Should we be offended or flattered?
      - eclipxe 12y ago
        Win-win all around
      - owyn 12y ago
        Interesting question: what is the lifetime value of a person who uses a search engine to a company like Google? Looks like about $180 per year at the moment: http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2014/06/ad_revenue_per_user_google_facebook_twitter.php http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/intelligence/2014/0...
- 12y ago

brightdream 12y ago

Google is uniquely positioned with the amount of data it has to uncover strong correlations between behavior and disease.

darkstar999 12y ago

Google is developing cancer [long inhale] and heart attack detector

loopasam 12y ago

Nano-bubbles and particles have been used since a long time to diagnose diseases and enhance the quality of ultrasound analysis (contrast agents). You can also link an antibody on their surface to target them against a particular protein or reveal a zone of interest (e.g. a tumor revealed by a specific biomarker). Nano-bubbles are even use to destroy adjacent tissue on purpose (sonoporation). Usually such particles are constructed via a mix of lipids and have a very short life time in the blood stream. I wonder how they're going to keep them alive in the blood stream for what seems to be a very long time and their design regarding toxicity.

steven 12y ago

I had the opportunity to speak to the head of this project Andrew Conrad at length. https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tricorder-12e1822e5e6a https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tric... What struck me was his optimism that this was really going to happen. Usually researchers are ultra cautious about going out on a limb like that (Yes, he said there was much to do, but read the interview to get his tone.) I think that comes from working at a place like Google X that encourages the big reach.

drcode 12y ago
I think many people who have been seriously involved in medicine will tell you that there's many low hanging fruit in medicine that are being missed because misaligned incentive structures in the health care sector- This project sounds like a possible example of this. We can only hope that a few well-capitalized companies like Google can have the vision to see these low hanging fruit, and will be able to bear the near-term risks and costs and take some difficult steps to reap some significant profits over a longer term.
JoeH 12y ago
I was diagnosed with a cancerous tumor less than a year ago. It is a tumor that has been growing inside me for at least 5 years. Had it been correctly detected/diagnosed 5 years ago, it would have been an operable tumor with a high chance of a cure rate. Unfortunately, now that tumor is currently non-operable. Current cancer screening guidelines aren't sufficient and in almost all cases they utterly fail in the early detection of cancers for people under the age of 50. I applaud anyone working towards a better method for early detection!
- mattfrommars 12y ago
  Stay strong. I use your application as well, rescuetimer. I really like the logging it does. Can you tell me if it is written in C++ or is it mostly and mixed with other languages as well?
- kendalk 12y ago
  I am so sorry to hear that! My mother, also, was found with a tumor that we didn't know about for a long time. She fought as long as she could. She never gave up hope. Doctors don't know everything. There are ways to fight, even natural ones. Fighting with anything is better than giving up. Hope is very powerful. Don't give up. Keep fighting. Best wishes to you from one who has walked this road with another.

millstone 12y ago

This sounds great and I hope they're successful. That said, what's the point of pre-announcing stuff like this, when it's at such an early stage? Is it just goodwill?

munificent 12y ago
From this article[1]: There’s still a million crazy things that happen with people, and there’s a long journey to put medicines into people, and it has to be done in the open because we’re going to do experiments— people will be wearing these devices at our Baseline Study. And: Yeah. That’s part of the reason we had to talk about this. There’s a pretty substantial body of patents that describe what we’re talking about in great detail that will be publicly noticeable in the next month or so. [1]: https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tricorder-12e1822e5e6a https://medium.com/backchannel/were-hoping-to-build-the-tric...

brianstorms 12y ago

World's largest advertising company developing cancer and heart attack detector. Think of the great AdSense and AdWords lead generation opportunities coming. It's like printing money.

vertex-four 12y ago
They've generally been quite good at refusing to let advertisers target on sensitive subjects. It's probably a legal minefield in most developed countries, and it'd be a PR nightmare if there were any sort of adverse effects. "We won’t associate with an individual’s cookie any audiences considered sensitive, such as those based on race, religion, sexual orientation, health, certain financial information, and others."[0] [0] https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2497941?hl=en https://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2497941?hl=en

Lambdanaut 12y ago

I'm not worried about an "advertising agency" handling this project at all. Google is hardly just an ads agency anymore. They're multi-faceted. Maybe we should be concerned that they're(successfully) reaching their hands into just about every problem domain, but so far it's been good news for the consumer and they haven't done anything that I'm aware of to warrant them to be untrustworthy. That being said. Watch your diet and carb intake. Preventative measures are better than having to fix the disease at the last minute.

lovemenot 12y ago

Marketing, competition, new features, bugs, expoits, evolution. These things could go viral. Literally. A hard robots.txt equivalent cellular protocol might be needed to protect body parts from the gaze of Grey Google.

julius 12y ago

Specially trained dogs are able to sniff out stuff like cancerous cells or if a kid needs his insuline. Always wondered why we cannot build an artificial nose like that. Does anyone have any insights into this topic?

dnautics 12y ago
the cancer sniffing dog thing appears to be a case of Clever Hans
- julius 12y ago
  Did some quick googling. Seems like research so far supports the claim. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canine_cancer_detection http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canine_cancer_detection Is there any research, with different results, missing from the Wikipedia page?

sk2code 12y ago

Including my mom in the last 10 years I've lost 4 female members of family to cancer. This product is revolutionary no doubt and I am very excited about it. I believe Google will face an uphill task as there are lots of things to explain to the consumer before taking this full stream. 1. Will these nano particles stay in my blood stream forever or do I have to inject them in my body periodically. What are its side effects? 2. The wristband on my hand communicating with these nano particles in someway connects back to the Google's network and now along with my emails and pics Google is tracking my health and my DNA. I mean I can turn off my phone and not use my email but I can't turn off my body. When combined with the DNA this project has the potential to provide an RFID to each and every human being. Ignore my ignorance I am not the expert here just curious about all these possibilities.

malthaus 12y ago

why are they doing that - just because they can and it's a great headline? if i were a google shareholder i'd rather have them return excess money than go on those pet / "greenwashing" projects

zaroth 12y ago
They say this is how they are going to run the business in the prospectus. They are fully entitled to directing their own R&D efforts.

zaroth 12y ago

I imagine "killer app" is no longer the understatement when your next wearable actually actively monitors your health like this. I think the privacy concerns can be worked out, and they shouldn't slow down the research. Seeing the headline, I thought it would be an article monitoring passive signals to calculate risk scores, so I was really happy to see biochemistry. I think Google pouring funds into this kind of research will lead to some awesome advancements. It's easy to imagine a recurring revenue stream from a device like this which adds years to your lifespan. Owning a device like that actually reduces the cost of your life/disability insurance because anything that does go wrong gets discovered earlier with better outcomes. Actually, you could pay for the device out of those savings alone. It is amazing to think what the feature comparison chart for wearables in the next decade will look like.

cpuguy83 12y ago

Hmm... Anyone seen the show "Continuum"? You should. It's on Netflix. And would instantly raise some red flags for this.

Shivetya 12y ago

Reading the story all I can think of is the possibilities. Suspend the particles into and disperse with aerosol in public places and then scan for indicators you want as they walk through or by detectors. You could set it all up to report to individuals anonymously, but the idea of what a future of health care might be should include a system which requires no action on the patients. The privacy concerns could be immense or moot, but many would trade for the convenience

taf2 12y ago

Sounds pretty elaborate - perhaps if we could just work on a lower cost almost do it yourself access to an MRI or ultrasound detection as well as many other troubles in the body could be detected... But this is health care 7 billion opinions very few solutions beyond reducing pain and cutting stuff

quietriot 12y ago

Google is a developing cancer and heart attack...

reality_czech 12y ago

I read this as "cancer and heart attack deflector," and it seemed a lot more awesome than it really is. Oh well.