Turn Your iPhone 4 Into a Digital Microscope

Recently, apps like Star Walk and iStethoscope have opened my mind to what iOS and other mobile platforms could mean to science. Now we’re hearing about a slick new modification with easy-to-follow instructions that will let you use your iPhone 4 as a digital microscope . . . The best part? It’s really cheap and can be accomplished in however long it takes for a dab of super glue to dry.

Modder Crabfu has published a video that details the instructions very well, but in case you’re missing what’s so cool about this, let’s cover some of the benefits . . . Once you purchase the small microscope from some place like Amazon (for somewhere around $5-$15) and get it attached to your iPhone 4 case, users can snap pictures of magnified images and enjoy the fully digital functionality of the iPhone. Beyond taking pictures, this means you can use something like BlueCam for iPad to stream your iPhone 4’s video onto the larger iPad screen . . . This could definitely be useful for real-life scientific endeavors, but everyday people like us can also get a kick out of seeing the individual fibers of blue jeans or the close-up anatomy of, say, a dead fruit fly.

Also, we shouldn’t be intimidated by the word “mod.” The iPhone 4’s flat back makes it very easy to glue the microscope onto the case and then get magnifying. You can even skip this part and just hold the microscope against your camera lens (but it’s far cooler to attach it). I’d recommend breaking out the super glue and giving this one a try.

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Devin Wieland

 

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