Researchers at the University of Melbourne's Bionic Vision Australia project believe that diamonds are the best material to use in constructing a bionic eye.
According to a report from ABC.net.au, eye implants are currently made from metals such as platinum or iridium. But physicist Kumar Ganesan explains that even the hardest metals deteriorate after 5 to 10 years of being implanted, which is why the scientists have turned their gaze (so to speak) on the hardest substance in the world – diamonds.
As it happens, medicine has already made use of diamonds in optical devices, but the whole idea of a working bionic eye is still in development. Ganesan notes that the bionic eye he and his colleagues are working on would measure only 3 by 3 by one millimeters.
The device – which could be in clinical studies by the end of 2011 – would fit into the eye. The wearer would sport "a very tiny camera, like the people in spy movies," Ganesan says.
After Bionic Vision Australia presented their project at 2008's 2020 summit and asked for funding help, the federal government invested some AUS$51 million in the project. Researchers hope to have a final prototype bionic diamond eye ready by 2014, and say that their device could perform the save service for sight-impaired people as cochlear implants do for the deaf.
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