Souped-Up Contact Lenses Promise On-Demand Bionic Eyesight

An inventor at the University of Washington holds a flexible contact lens embedded with microcircuits. Researchers will place circuitry outside of the transparent part of the wearer’s eye. The lens will not obstruct a user’s sight when it isn’t activated.

Most advances in retinal implants concentrate on restoring, not enhancing, sight. But there’s hope yet for superhuman vision, and without surgery: A team at the University of Washington has created a contact lens assembled with functional circuitry and LEDs.

Potential uses include virtual displays for pilots, video-game projections and telescopic vision for soldiers. A working prototype of a lens-embedded antenna that draws power for the device from radio frequencies has also been created. The next steps are to build a version that can display several pixels—and then to test it on a person.

The UW team uses a technique called self-assembly to manufacture the eyewear.