【英语科技】怎样控制体重？问问手机吧

Thanks to smartphones with built-in cameras, we can easily take pictures anywhere, any time and immediately post them on the Web.

In Japan, one of the most popular subjects for mobile snapshots is food. Personal blogs abound with images of what blogger ate what food at restaurants or cooked at home. User-generated restaurant reviews rely heavily on photos taken with cellphones.

Soon those food snapshots will play a new role: They will help people monitor their own eating habits, keep track of calories and possibly become healthier, says NTT Communications Corp., a unit of Japanese telecommunications giant Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp. The company and two other Japanese firms said this week that they will together launch what they say is the world's first Internet-based mobile phone application designed to help users maintain good eating and exercise habits by analyzing the photos of the food they eat.

All you have to do is take a picture of every meal with your mobile phone, before taking the first bite. Then you access the Web-based application, tentatively called 'Health Enhancement Assist Service', and drop off the picture you just took -- just like when you post your photos on Facebook.

The service will not only analyze your photo and tell you how many calories are in the food, but it will also let you know what kinds of food you should have in your next meal to make sure you don't go over the suggested calorie intake. And if you insist on having another big meal, it can show you what kinds of exercise you need in order to burn the excessive calories.

University of Tokyo researchers are helping the companies develop the technology for analyzing food images. According to an NTT Communications spokeswoman, the system can now recognize many different types of food; but when you have several different plates in a single meal, you need to photograph one plate at a time.

To make the analysis more complete, the new application also comes with a pedometer: Throughout the day it calculates the calories you are burning as you walk around with your mobile phones.

The application will store all this information on the Web (not on your mobile phone) and you can access it any time; it's like having your own nutritionist and personal trainer. The free trial version of the service will be widely available in Japan in January for users of Apple Inc.'s iPhone or smartphones that run on Google Inc.'s Android operating system. The companies are aiming for a commercial launch of the application some time after April. Meanwhile, smartphone users are increasing as every major mobile carrier in Japan is rushing to release new Android-based handsets.

So if you ever find it annoying when people next to you at restaurants take out their cellphones to photograph all the food, remember, they may not be trying to tell the world what they're eating, they might just be trying to avoid putting on a few pounds.

现在的智能手机都安装了内置相机，于是我们可以随时随地轻松拍照，还可以立即把这些照片放到网上。

Reuters想知道这个汉堡含有多少热量吗？用手机拍一张照片就知道了。在日本，手机拍摄的最流行主题之一就是食物。许多人将自己下饭馆吃的或在家动手做的饭菜拍成照片放在博客里。用户发布的餐馆评论主要是用手机拍下来的其饭菜照片。

日本电报电话公司(Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp.)旗下全资子公司NTT Communications Corp.表示，这些食物照片很快就会发挥新作用，即帮助人们监督自己的饮食习惯并记录其摄入的卡路里，人们或许会因此变得更加健康。该公司与另外两家日本公司本周表示，将共同推出世界上第一个基于因特网的手机应用软件，该软件可通过分析手机用户每日所进餐食的照片，从而帮助他们保持良好的饮食和体育锻炼习惯，

而手机用户所要做的，就是在吃饭之前用手机将每顿饭菜拍下来，然后利用暂时名为“协助增进健康服务”(Health Enhancement Assist Service)的网络软件，将刚才拍的照片放到网上，操作过程与你把照片放在Facebook上类似。

这套软件将不仅可以分析你的照片、告诉你的饭菜中含有多少卡路里，还可以让你知道下一顿饭自己应该吃什么，以确保不要超过建议的卡路里摄取量。而如果你坚持下一顿还吃大餐，该软件会告诉你为燃烧多余的卡路里应做什么运动。

东京大学(University of Tokyo)的研究者正在协助上述公司研发分析食物照片的技术。NTT Communications发言人透露说，这套系统现在可识别多种食物，但如果一顿饭中摆着盛有不同菜肴的好几个盘子，应一次拍下一盘菜。

为使分析更加完整，这套新软件还带有一个计步器，只要你身上带着手机，就可计算出你一整天通过走路消耗了多少卡路里。

这套软件会将所有信息储存在网上，而不是手机上，你可以随时查看这些信息，这就好像有了一个私人营养师和健身教练。明年1月苹果公司(Apple Inc.)使用谷歌(Google Inc.)Android操作系统的iPone用户或智能手机用户将可在日本广泛使用这套软件的免费测试版。公司计划在明年4月以后的某个时间推出这套软件的商业版。由于日本各大手机运营商都在争相推出基于Android系统的新手机，智能手机用户数量不断增加。

因此，如果你发现饭馆里有人很讨厌地用手机为每一道菜拍照片，请记得：他们这样做不一定是要告诉全世界自己吃了什么，或许他们仅仅是为了让自己不要再增肥。