Polymer Film Could Put Computer Screens on Contact Lenses
A collegiate research group has devised potential ocular tech that could be a “game changer.”
Research completed by the University of South Australia’s Future Industries Institute states that a conceptual polymer film coating could turn contact lenses into computer screens, Phys.Org reported Thursday.
The UniSA group was able to complete a “proof of concept” — documented evidence of a latent invention or service’s potential — that a polymer coating capable of conducting electricity, applied to contact lenses, could enable the vision aid to safely support minuscule circuitry.
The full article, titled “Hydrophilic Organic Electrodes on Flexible Hydrogels,” explains that: “The fabrication of this conductively coated hydrogel has implications for the future of wearable electronic devices.” Phys.Org connected with UniSA Associate Professor Drew Evans, who explained that such tech would be a “game changer” that could potentially generate images onto a treated lens, “actually creating electronic displays so rather than having something like a pair of glasses that’s acting like a computer…We have always known that our film coating technologies had potential for many applications and now we have taken that a step further by proving that we can make biocompatible, conducting polymers at the nanoscale and grow them directly on a contact lens.”
