New Bionic Eye Could Give Blind People Rudimentary Sight

The Phoenix99 is a pair of glasses equipped with a tiny video camera that captures the wearer’s field of vision in front of them. This image is converted to a wireless signal and then transmitted to a communication module implanted under the skin behind the wearer’s ear. The device bypasses the retinal ganglion cells that no longer work and stimulates the ones that still do to transmit the image to the brain. Preliminary testing showed positive results, and the device will face ethical approval and human clinical trials next.