Checking your sperm count has been made a whole lot easier by a remarkable new invention
Your iPhone can do many things. But up until now, measuring a man's sperm count wasn't one of them.
But thanks to a new invention from Japanese researcher Yoshitomo Kobori, your little pocket computer is about to become a sexual health clinic.
Dr. Kobori has created a type of lens that can be fitted to the smartphone's camera. Dropping a sperm sample onto the lens and filming it will create footage that can then be analysed by a lab.
The idea behind it is that men are often too anxious to visit the clinic - but almost all of us have smartphones. The lens itself is inexpensive and creates, in Kobori's words "a semen test at home."
“The lens is not made for a smartphone - it was made nine years ago," he said .
"I’m improving the lens and thinking about how to attach it to a smartphone and analyze sperm.
"Men are thinking that semen analyses are an embarrassment, inconvenience, disgrace and waste of time."
Dr. Kobori is currently a visiting fellow at the University of Illinois in Chicago.
Roberta Dupuis-Devlin/UIC Photo Services
Last month, Swedish sex toy company Lelo claimed to have developed the "condom of the future", which has been re-engineered to prevent breakage, reduce slippage and eliminate discomfort.
Known as Hex, each condom is made up of 350 ultra-thin latex hexagons arranged in a honeycomb structure, which Lelo claims allows it to flex and mold to the wearer's shape.