Pigeons can spot cancer on medical images ‘as well as humans’
IT SEEMS PIGEONS may not be so bird-brained after all. A team at the University of California, Davis has trained the birds to pick out cancerous breast tissue on mammograms.
After two weeks of training, using food as motivation, the pigeons were able to correctly identify cancerous tissue 85 per cent of the time. This is a level of accuracy similar to that of human radiologists.
“Research over the past 50 years has shown that pigeons can distinguish identities and emotional expressions on human faces, letters of the alphabet, misshapen pharmaceutical capsules, and even paintings by Monet vs Picasso,” said co-author Edward Wasserman. “Their visual memory is equally impressive, with a proven recall of more than 1,800 images.”
Even after years of training, physicians can sometimes struggle to correctly interpret mammograms. The process is also time-consuming, labourintensive and expensive. Though it’s unlikely you will ever be booking an appointment with a pigeon GP, lead researcher Prof Richard Levenson believes that the common birds could play a part in further developments in imaging and display technologies.
“Pigeons’ sensitivity to diagnostically salient features in medical images suggests that they can provide reliable feedback on many variables at play in the production, manipulation, and viewing of these diagnostically crucial tools, and can assist researchers and engineers as they continue to innovate,” he said.