Bionic Eye

Visions of the Future: The Development of Bionic Lenses

"We can rebuild him – we have the technology!" And so began The Six Million Dollar Man, an astronaut reconstructed with bionic parts to be part-man, part-cyborg, all-awesome. As with many film and TV franchises of the 70s, both the action and the technology in The Six Million Dollar Man and The Bionic Woman are rich in wishful thinking. However, 30 years later, engineers at the University of Washington have made a bionic contact lens that takes us a step closer to the cyborg dream.

The research was presented at an international conference at the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. The bionic contact lens is a master of nanotechnology and microfabrication, reconciling the fundamental difference between the polymers used for contact lenses and the material used in microchips and light-emitting diodes (LEDs). The electronic circuits are so fine as to be only one-thousandth the width of a human hair. Although circuitry covers much of the current prototype's surface it would not obstruct a person's view.

Scientists expect that with the basic capacity for electric circuits in place the lens could develop displays in the future. This would mean they not only correct vision but also act as a tiny, flexible, wireless display screen.

The possibilities for the contact lenses are manifold. Projecting information over the vision of the wearer has exciting possibilities for gaming in a virtual world and simulation training.

We could also see portable devices as we know them now – laptops, mobile phones, tablets –shift in form as screen is separated from device and placed directly on the eye. Commuters could check the morning's news surfing the web discreetly and wirelessly.

Aside from display screens, the ability to minimise electrical devices and place them unobtrusively on the body could be a substantial breakthrough for health care. Babak Parviz, an assistant professor involved in the project has said: "A lot of indicators that tell if a person is healthy or not show up on the surface of the eye". Contact lenses equipped with bio-sensors could be collect health data in a non-invasive way and transmit it straight to patient records. They could also be used in conjunction with retinal implants to correct vision problems.

The lens has so far been tested on rabbits but has some way to go before being operational. In particular, scientists will have to find a way for the retina to focus sharply on images displayed so close. We can only look to the future and wait.

Bionic Eye

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