You might want to practise some breath-control before you go to China. Chinese scientists have reportedly developed a mini-camera to scan crowds for highly stressed individuals, who, it turns out, have a greater chance of turning out to be suicide bombers.
The camera works by detecting the level of blood oxygenation in exposed areas of the body, such as the face, says a report in the South China Morning Post.
“The higher the mental stress, the higher the blood oxygenation,” says Chen Tong, an associate professor of electronic information engineering at the Southwest University in Chongqing, who developed the technology along with his research team.
The camera contains a “stress sensor” that uses hyperspectral imaging to examine information across the electromagnetic spectrum. According to the report, officers looking at a crowd through the device would see a mental “stress bar” above each person’s head, which, I imagine, is not unlike playing League of Legends in real life.
Will this work? I’m no expert at this but I’m sceptical. Let’s say they were using this at an airport: how would an official be able to differentiate between someone who’s stressed out because they plan to blow the place up and someone who’s about to miss a flight? Or someone with a lot of misplaced luggage?
God knows I’ve had both of those happen to me. More than once. [South China Morning Post]