Google has announced a new name for its Life Sciences division, giving it the name Verily with a goal to understand disease at the individual level.
Life Sciences division was formed at the Google X lab a few years ago and broaden as an independent company under Alphabet last August. Projects under its new name include developing a contact lens with a built-in glucose sensor, but it clearly has bigger goals.
Verily is an archaic word for "truly" and "certainly." It was chosen because the group wants to expose a true picture of health and disease. It is still composed of the same team except it is bigger now, with more doctors, engineers and even a staff philosopher to understand why people do what they do.
It will focus more on bringing together technology, science and medicine in the places where it can create the biggest impact on the detection, management, and prevention of disease, according to TechCrunch.
The newly named division is a hardware team that creates small devices that will monitor individuals' health and signal when something is wrong. Its software engineers are writing programs to help identify diseases more quickly and prescribe the right treatment.
Verily plans to continue working on futuristic projects such as smart contact lenses and the mysterious blood-sucking smartwatch.
In addition, Verily is already working on more wearables that include those that can detect cancer at very early stages, and other projects to reach its goals, Engadget reported. In the future, the spinoff plans to join forces with external companies to be able to make the technologies it develops available to people who verily need them.