JNU team develops revolutionary device for bringing light to the blind

New Delhi: A PhD scholar at Jawaharlal Nehru University's School of Computational and Integrative Sciences (SCIS), with guidance from his mentor Dr Binod Kumar Kanaujia, has developed an artificial intelligence device which will help visually-impaired people get an impression of objects and/or persons in front of them.

The entire apparatus comprises of a chip and an antenna placed inside the retina, as well as spectacles mounted with a video camera and an antenna which will be worn by the blind person.

Explaining the normal process of image formation in the eye, the scholar Vikrant Kaim said that photoreceptor cells capture light coming from the outside, using which a picture engraved over the retina.

However, in visually impaired people, these photoreceptor cells are damaged.

"The antenna and circuits inside the camera will the record the image of the outside environment. After this, the signal from the glasses's antenna will reach to the antenna of the chip in the retina," Kaim said.

"The chip will be connected by a small circuit to the antenna and it will receive outside images through the signal from the camera," he added. The signals will finally be processed by the chip and an image will be formed on the retina of the wearer.

"With the help of artificial intelligence equipment, such people will get an impression of objects (in front of them). The entire function will work through wireless connectivity," Kaim told Millennium Post.

He said the faculty at the SCIS plan on providing the entire apparatus to visually impaired people at highly affordable costs, compared to similar devices available in other parts of the world.

Kaim further said that the antenna will work throughout a person's life. "We are working on improving the chip. The device's antenna is capable of running throughout the person's life," he added.