There is a new kind of bionic eye that will “bypass most of the visual system entirely,” meaning it can feed output from a digital camera directly into the brain.
The new bionic eye system was developed at Monash University in Clayton, Victoria, and utilizes a camera attached to a pair of glasses, that shoots data directly to a processing unit.
Signals from the processing unit are then sent directly into the brain, where they’re split up across 11 implanted tiles, each with 43 electrodes.
The researchers are hopeful that stimulation of the brain area where those tiles will be placed will result in a 500-pixel field-of-vision, which would allow even blind people to see flashes of light.
Look for the new bionic eye technique to be tested on people who have recently lost their sight in accidents, a very interesting application of the technology.
