Smart CONTACT LENS can improve your vision while looking at conditions like diabetes and strokes by measuring chemicals in tear fluid
- The new contact lens design comes from researchers from the UK, USA and China
- It has a gauge sensor that measures the light, temperature and glucose levels
- At the same time, the team said it did not impair sight or the ability to blink.
- In future versions new test features and wireless antennas may be added
In addition to improving your vision, a new smart contact lens design can also monitor for conditions such as diabetes, heart disease and stroke, a study reported.
Researchers from the UK, US and China have developed the lens, with a mesh sensor layer that can measure the levels of light, temperature and even glucose in tears.
The latter has been used outside of monitoring diabetes, the team said, with complications of stroke and heart disease closely linked to the disruption of blood glucose regulation.
The design, according to the team, does not have the vision of the wearer or the ability to clip, and can be adapted in the future to also facilitate retinal function tests.
Power modules and antennas can even be attached to the lenses, which could potentially send the wireless data wirelessly to a computer for analysis.
In addition to improving your vision, a new smart contact lens design can monitor for conditions such as diabetes, heart disease and stroke, a study reported (stock image)
Researchers from the UK, US and China have developed the lens (left on an artificial eye), with a mesh sensor layer (yellow, shown right) that can measure levels of light, temperature and even glucose in tears to monitor for health complications
“The Covid-19 pandemic has had an enormous impact on the entire scientific community,” Yunlong Zhao, author and bioelectronics expert at the University of Surrey’s Advanced Technology Institute, told the Times.
Many of us have, he added, ‘asked how our work helps those who can help with similar future medical emergencies’.
“We are confident that devices using our sensor coating system can be used as a non-invasive way to monitor and diagnose human health.”
“Our ultra-thin sensor layer differs from ordinary smart contact lenses,” Harvard University author and engineer Shiqi Guo told the Times.
These lens designs usually contain ‘rigid or bulk sensors and circuit chips built in between two contact lens layers and make contact with tear fluids via microfluidic observation channels.’
In the new lens design, however, the serpentine sensor mesh contacts directly with cracks – comes with ‘easy mounting, sensitive sensitivity, good biocompatibility and mechanical robustness’, said dr. Guo added.
“Furthermore, it does not interfere with a wink or vision,” he said.
The design, according to the team, does not have the vision of the wearer or the ability to clip, and can be adapted in the future to also facilitate retinal function tests. Pictured: the winding mesh, pictured left, with the three different sensor modalities and, right, the full lens itself
The lens is one of the attempts to develop a ‘smart’ contact lens – whether it should monitor blood glucose levels or in the form of a soft robot that allows the wearer to zoom in by blinking.
One design – from the start of Mojo Vision in California and with a processor built in the UK – features a small LED screen that packs 300 pixels within a half square millimeter that can show content that the carrier is carrying from their phone is being streamed.
“We need to build something that shows you information that does not distract you, helps you, disappears when you do not need it, and stays off when you do not want it,” Mojo product manager Steve Sinclair told Times . .
The full findings of the study were published in the journal Matter.