Like A Miracle, Blind People Can See Again With These Smart Glasses

JAKARTA - Scientists all over the world work together to create the latest tools to help people who experience problems with their body parts, one of which is blindness.

Returning vision to the visually impaired is the biggest challenge for researchers. A team of engineers from the EPFL (École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne) Switzerland, have developed a technology that can restore vision for those with blindness or visual impairment.

Launching Slashgear, the team has succeeded in developing retinal implants with smart glasses that are equipped with a camera and microcomputer. This system is designed to provide vision to blind people using electrodes to stimulate their retinal cells.

The camera embedded in the smart glasses will capture the image in the wearer's field of view, then send the data to a microcomputer to be placed on one end of the glasses.

This microcomputer converts the data into light signals that are sent to electrodes in a retinal implant. The electrodes will stimulate the retina so that the eyeglass wearer can see the image in black and white. The user will see an image composed of dots of light when the retina is stimulated.

However, users of these technology devices must be familiar and begin to learn to interpret these points of light in certain shapes and objects. Scientists have likened the method of interpreting the points of light to looking at the night sky and learning to recognize the constellations.

However, this device has not been tested on humans. The latest development of this device is being developed by using virtual reality to simulate what patients see in their retinal implants.

The retinal implant contains 10,500 electrodes, with each electrode working to produce dots of light. This is a challenge in itself for the development of retinal implants combined with smart glasses.