Even though, scientists have been able to develop bionic eye lens, a visual prosthesis intended to restore functional vision to those suffering from partial or total blindness, but none have been able to restore sight to congenitally blind people. However, Israeli scientists have just achieved this feat by developing a new kind of bionic contact lens that will enable people who are blind from birth to see.

The new technology, developed by a team at Bar-Ilan University, consists of a tiny camera that receives visual information from the environment and transmits signals to a bionic contact lens. The lens passes the signals through electrodes to the cornea and from there to sensory brain areas, generating a stimulus that simulates visual information.

“This technology is good news for humanity, especially in bringing sight to people blind from birth without requiring surgery or damaging other vital senses or organs,” says Prof. Zeev Zalevsky, head of Electrical Engineering and Nanophotonics at Bar-Ilan University, who headed the research team.

In recent years, several companies around the world have developed bionic eye lens, but all of them have been of little help to those who are congenitally blind. Aside from being invasive, existing bionic eye technology requires surgery and depend on the stimulation of brain areas that process sight, which is normally developed in childhood. This makes it unsuitable for those who are blind from birth, since those areas of the brain are not developed in congenitally blind people.

According to the report published in Optical Engineering and Development, the new technology, attempts to deal with the problems of existing bionic eye technologies to enable even people who are blind from birth to see.

For existing bionic eye, the visual resolution enables the wearer distinguish between light, darkness and shadows, but cannot help them to see entire objects or letters, or to be independently mobile.

“In contrast, the new Israeli technology consists of a tiny camera with an image compressor and an electric signal amplifier located outside the patient’s body and can be attached to his eye glasses or to a cellular device. Super resolution techniques are used to encode an image of numerous pixels and compress it into few pixels,” explains Zalevsky.

“The encoding enables compressing static visual sights, reducing the pixels yet allowing transmission of visual information similar to a healthy person’s vision.

The compressed information is transmitted, after being electrically amplified, from the minute camera by wireless technology to a bionic contact lens in the eye. The proposed lens will have some 10,000 tiny electrodes enabling cornea stimulation. The cornea is the richest eye part in sensory nerves and has tens of thousands of sensory points to which the tiny electrodes on the lens can connect with,” he said.

According to Zalevsky, the new technology is like a Braille lens that enables blind people to see in a way similar to Braille reading.

The report says the system’s feasibility has been tested on 10 seeing subjects with a model simulating the bionic lens, which transmits stimuli to the finger rather than the cornea.

The scientists say they have taught the testees to decode simple images and then to transmit, with finger signals, images received by an external camera.

“At this state, the visual stimulus among the subjects enables spatial vision in black, white and gray, in low 100-pixel resolution.

But the actual lens will consist of 10,000 electrodes that will enable the wearer receive visual images of much higher resolution and perhaps color in the future,” says Zalevsky.

Meanwhile, a Canadian doctor, Dr. Garth Webb, claims he’s invented an implantable artificial lens that could give someone vision that is better than 20/20.

20/20 vision is a term used to express normal visual acuity (the clarity or sharpness of vision) measured at a distance of 20 feet. According to the American Optometrics Association, if one has 20/20 vision, it means the person can see clearly at 20 feet what should normally be seen at that distance. But if it’s a 20/100 vision, it means he or she must be as close as 20 feet to see what a person with normal vision can see at 100 feet.

However, the association explained that 20/20 does not necessarily mean perfect vision. “It only indicates the sharpness or clarity of vision at a distance. There are other important vision skills, including peripheral awareness or side vision, eye coordination, depth perception, focusing ability and color vision that contribute to your overall visual ability.

Some people can see well at a distance, but are unable to bring nearer objects into focus. This condition can be caused by hyperopia (farsightedness) or presbyopia (loss of focusing ability). Others can see items that are close, but cannot see those far away. This condition may be caused by myopia (nearsightedness)”, it said.

But Dr. Webb also the CEO of Ocumetics Technology Corporation says people could see three times better than 20/20 with this new lens. According to him, the procedure would take only eight minutes for an experienced ophthalmologist to perform, after which the patient wouldn’t need glasses ever again. There are a lot of unanswered questions, but this isn’t completely outside the realm of possibility.

www.nationalmirroronline.net/new/scientists-develop-bionic-eye-for-people-born-blind/

welcome development

Has it been scientifically proved and tested??.

Hmmmm. In the latter days knowledge shall increase.
This is good to hear.