The hologram has long been the realm of science fiction for years with from Holo Deck on “Star Trek: The Next Generation” to the holographic doctor aboard “Star Trek: Voyager.” Any fan of science fiction knows that technology often seen in science fiction has a history of becoming fact before long.

Most people are familiar with holograms used for security on items from credit cards to software to prevent piracy. Holograms can also be used to display information such as output from a computer or TV. The common thread with these common types of holograms is that they have only one state of being.

A new type of hologram was developed by Chris Lowe and Cynthia Larbey form a company called Smart Holograms. Smart Holograms is a spin-off company from the Institute of Biotechnology at Cambridge University.

Smart Holograms’ first invention based on its technology is a syringe used to measure water content in aviation fuels. The syringe uses one of the company’s smart holograms that are built using hydrogels that shrink or swell in response to conditions of the environment.

Smart Holograms sees many other uses for its hologram technology from easier methods for diabetics to measure their blood sugar to detecting chemicals like anthrax giving security forces an easy to understand test result.

Lowe and Larbey say, “Visual images produced by smart holograms can be made to appear or disappear under appropriate chemical or biological stimuli which makes them ideal for use in Breathalyzers, monitoring heart conditions and for various security and smart packaging systems.”

The hydrogel used in the smart holograms can swell up to 1,000 times its original volume. The holographic gratings can be built into the volume of hydrogel and made to respond to humidity, water, solvents, dissolved gasses, ions, metabolites, drugs, antibiotics, sugars or enzymes for example.