A new lens made from the same material found in smartphones and television screens and could be implanted in the eye could herald a new era of enhanced vision, thanks to a University of Leeds researcher developing the product.
Devesh Mistry, an incoming 2nd year postgraduate research student in the university’s School of Physics and Astronomy, is currently working with liquid crystal to produce an adjustable artificial lens aimed at helping restore long-sightedness in the elderly.
Presbyopia is a condition common in those ages 45 and above, marked by lenses increasingly losing their flexibility and elasticity and requires the use of eyeglasses and other optical aids.
The lens in the eye stiffens during aging and when the eye muscles contract they are unable to shape the lens for bringing nearby objects into focus, said Mistry, now researching and developing the product in the lab and targeting to have a prototype available by the end of his doctoral studies in 2018.
Mistry, recently granted an Industrial Fellowship by the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851, favored the use of liquid crystals, which are deemed “under-rated” compared with other phases of matter such as solids, liquids and gases. Yet they are found to be lying between crystalline solids and liquids. They are commonly used in the screens of smartphones and TVs.
“[L]enses would adjust and focus automatically, depending on the eye muscles’ movement,” he explained.
The material will be the basis for the synthetic replacements for the affected eye lens. Such eye lenses will be among next-generation intra-ocular lens implants for sight renewal, hoped to be implanted into eyes during surgery (under local anesthesia) within a decade of research. The lenses are also poised to be useful in cataracts, which affect many aging individuals as well.
Mistry is collaborating with the University of Manchester’s Eurolens Research and Ultravision CLPL, a manufacturer of specialized contact lenses. The liquid crystal lenses are hoped to be available commercially 6 to 10 years from now.
This new breed of artificial lens is among the number of high-tech solutions for better vision. University of Washington experts featured two promising devices: electric prostheses for stimulating surviving cells with a rage of electrodes on the retina, and optogenetics, which will make surviving retinal cells light-sensitive through inserting proteins into them.
Photo: Mark Yuen | Flickr
