Drones may be boon to public health research

From tracking changes in landscapes and animal behavior that could be linked to disease transmission, to hunting for survivors in the wake of a humanitarian disaster, aerial drones are proving an effective tool in public health research. Nathan Eagle, adjunct assistant professor of epidemiology at Harvard School of Public Health, told NPR in an October 22, 2014 article that prices of drones are dropping and their functionality is improving, which could lead to wider use in the next few years.

Eagle is a pioneer in the field of “reality mining,” which attempts to find patterns in large sets of data which can shed light on health behaviors and track the spread of disease.

Read NPR article: Drones are taking pictures that could demystify a malaria surge