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An Indian-American imaging scientist and inventor has been awarded the prestigious Lemelson-MIT Prize. Ramesh Raskar, founder of the Camera Culture research group at the MIT Media Lab, and associate professor of media arts and sciences at MIT, was awarded the $500,000 Prize.
Raskar is the co-inventor of radical imaging solutions including femtophotography, an ultra-fast imaging system that can see around corners; low-cost eye-care solutions for the developing world; and a camera that allows users to read pages of a book without opening the cover. Over the next three years, Raskar will be investing a portion of the prize money to support the development of young inventors.
“Raskar seeks to catalyze change on a massive scale by launching platforms that empower inventors to create solutions to improve lives globally,” the university said in a Sept. 13 press release.
Raskar is considered a pioneer in the fields of imaging, computer vision and machine learning and his novel imaging platforms offer an understanding of the world “that far exceeds human ability,” the release said. He has mentored more than 100 students, visiting students, interns, and post-doctoral students, who, with his guidance and support, have been able to kick-start their own highly successful careers.
The Lemelson-MIT Prize honors outstanding mid-career inventors improving the world through technological invention and demonstrating a commitment to mentorship in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics , STEM.
“We are thrilled to honor Ramesh Raskar, whose breakthrough research is impacting how we see the world,” Dorothy Lemelson, chair of The Lemelson Foundation is quoted saying. “Ramesh’s femtophotography work not only has the potential to transform industries ranging from internal medicine to transportation safety, it is also helping to inspire a new generation of inventors to tackle the biggest problems of our time.”
In 2012, Raskar co-created femtophotography, an advanced form of photography allowing cameras to see around corners. The technology, currently in development for commercialization, uses ultrafast imaging to capture light at 1 trillion frames per second, allowing the camera to create slow motion videos of light in motion. Raskar and his team have received significant funding from sponsors including the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the National Science Foundation, and MIT to further develop the idea of using “scattered light imaging” to see around corners.
Raskar is the co-founder of EyeNetra, an inexpensive, disruptive eye-care platform that spun out of Media Lab research. EyeNetra enables on-demand eye testing in remote locations via a hand-held technology that snaps onto a mobile device. When looking into the binocular the user is provided with interactive cues to rapidly calculate a prescription for eyeglasses.The young company has performed eye-tests for hundreds of thousands of subjects and is currently active in the U.S., Brazil, and India.
Raskar’s team has also worked on many areas of preventable blindness, low vision, and diagnostics at MIT. In 2013, he and his colleagues launched LVP- MITRA in Hyderabad.
He is also the founder of the Emerging Worlds Initiative, a public-private partnership that links with MIT researchers, young innovators, and entrepreneurs, to work on very specific integrated ecosystems.
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