It is a part of the "frugal science" movement which aims to make cheap and easy tools available for scientific use in the developing world.
[2] The Foldscope was developed by a team led by Manu Prakash, an assistant professor of bioengineering at the Stanford School of Medicine.
[3] The project was funded by several organisations including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which gave a grant of US$100,000 for research in November 2012.
Prakash claims that the Foldscope can survive harsh conditions, including being thrown in water or dropped from a five-story building.
[5][6] The Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation funded the "Ten Thousand Microscopes" project under which Prakash plans to give away 10,000 Foldscope kits to interested parties, including students for research.
Examples of uses submitted by testers include a plant pathologist in Rwanda who used it to examine fungi on banana crops and Maasai children in Tanzania who used it to check cow feces for parasites.
When tested for diagnosing schistosomiasis in Ghana, for example, it was impossible to prevent contamination from urine samples because the Foldscope must be brought up to one's face to view.