A chip inside the eye that can help blind people see again is moving
closer to reality as researchers at MIT work on a retinal implant that
can bypass damaged cells and directly offer visual input to the brain.
Patients who receive the implant will wear a pair of glasses that has
a tiny camera attached to it. The camera will send images to a
microchip implanted in the eyeball that channels the input to the
brain.
It won’t entirely restore normal vision, say the researchers, but it
will offer just enough sight to help a blind person navigate a room.
“If they can recognize faces of people in a room, that brings them
into the social environment as opposed to sitting there waiting for
someone to talk to them,” says Shawn Kelly, a a researcher in MIT’s
Research Laboratory for Electronics and a member of the project.
MIT’s latest quest should be of interest to people like Rob Spence, a
Canadian film maker who is on a quest to put a tiny wireless video
camera into his empty right eye socket. Spence is looking to capture
the world around him and a retinal implant like that from MIT could
actually help bring him closer to his quest.
Here’s how the implant works. The glasses that patients wear contains
a coil that can wirelessly transmit power to receiving coils
surrounding the eyeball. The eyeball holds a microchip encased in a
sealed titanium case to avoid damage from water seepage. The chip
receives visual information and activates electrodes that in turn fire
the nerve cells that carry visual input to the brain.
A research team, led by MIT professor of electrical engineering John
Wyatt, plans to start testing the prototype in blind patients within
the next three years.
With feedback, researchers can configure the algorithm implemented by
the chip to produce useful vision. Ultimately, the goal is to produce
a chip that can be implanted for at least 10 years.
It’s a risky and challenging procedure as researchers have to design
an implant that won’t damage the eye. In the October issue of IEEE
Transactions on Biomedical Engineering journal, researchers have said
they hope to attach the implant to the outside of the eye, and put the
electrodes behind the retina.
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