Prosthetic Eye Lets a Patient See Braille

Nov-27-12 The Argus II prosthetic eye is able to send digital information directly to the nerve cells, allowing a blind patient to read Braille patterns without needing to touch the page.

The original prosthetic, which has already been approved in Europe, features a small, glasses-mounted camera, a portable processor and a microchip with electrodes implanted on the retina. The processor translates the images collected by the camera to electrical signals, which are then used to stimulate patterns on the nerve cells. The new tests of the prosthetic left out the camera, and the retina was stimulated directly to create the Braille patterns. In tests, the patient was able to “see” the Braille patterns with up to 89 percent accuracy.

The new study proves that, with the addition of letter recognition software, the Argus II could be adapted to provide an alternative and potentially faster method of text reading for the visually impaired.

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