Class 10 student from Tamil Nadu develops device to detect 'silent' heart attack

Meet 15-year-old Akash Manoj, a class 10 student from Tamil Nadu, who has at this tender age developed a new device that can detect the ‘silent’ heart attacks.

The new innovation called "Non-invasive self diagnosis of silent heart attack" by Akash, who is staying n Rashtrapati Bhavan as a guest of President Pranab Mukherjee under "Innovation Scholars In-Residence Programme", may save many lives in rural areas. 

"Silent heart attacks are extremely deadly and alarmingly common these days. In these cases, almost no symptoms are evident and thus people look so healthy to us," Manoj said.

Since he was in Class 8, Akash has been reading medical literature for fun and he has been visiting the library at the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru since then.

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“Journal articles are expensive, so visiting the libraries was the only way I could do it. Otherwise, it would have cost more than a crore (of rupees) for the amount I read. I was always interested in medical science and I liked reading the journals…cardiology is my favourite,” said Manoj.

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