6
doc • Spring 2014
Kentucky
Bionic Eye Implants
By Angela S. Hoover,
Staff Writer
Biotechnology is offering a
lot of promise for the vision
impaired who still have
functioning optic nerves.
When the optic nerve is fine, it usually
means the retina is not working. Retinal
diseases include retinitis pigmentosa (RP),
age-related macular degeneration (AMD),
and diabetic retinopathy. Retinal diseases
result in the light-sensitive rods and cones
(photoreceptors) in the retina to stop working. In healthy eyes, the photoreceptors take
light and turn it into tiny electrochemical
impulses that are sent through the optic
nerve to the brain for decoding into images.
When the photoreceptors stop working
effectively, the initial conversion process
fails and the brain cannot translate the light
into images.
Bionic eye implants focus on the initial
conversion process with the photoreceptors
to relay the impulses to the optic nerve. In
order to do this, some sort of transmitter is
needed behind the retina. The key to better
imaging is more electrodes, and thus higher
resolution. Although many research groups
are working on bionic eyes with even more
el