It is estimated that one in three rare and genetic diseases show up in these features, which could aid an earlier diagnosis. Researchers from Curtin University in Australia have developed a tool, as part of the Cliniface project, which scans the face, creating a 3D image. It then measures the distance between facial features and compares them with the average measurement for their ethnicity, sex and age according to their system. By way of example, they use Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD), an umbrella term used to describe the range of effects caused by alcohol exposure in the uterus. Researchers have developed a too, called Cliniface, which scans the person's face and then creates a 3D image of it.

David Aguilar has built himself a robotic prosthetic arm using Lego pieces after being born without a right forearm due to a rare genetic condition. Aguilar, 19, who studies bioengineering at the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya in Spain, is already using his fourth model of the colorful prosthetic and his dream is to design affordable robotic limbs for those who need them. Once his favorite toys, the plastic bricks became the building material for Aguilar's first, still very rudimentary, artificial arm at the age of nine, and each new version had more movement capability than the one before. David Aguilar has built himself a robotic prosthetic arm using Lego pieces after being born without a right forearm due to a rare genetic condition. 'As a child I was very nervous to be in front of other guys, because I was different, but that didn't stop me believing in my dreams,' Aguilar, who is from Andorra, a tiny principality between Spain and France, told Reuters.