Retinal Implant

A retinal implant, often called a bionic eye, is an electronic visual prosthesis surgically implanted in the eye to restore a degree of vision to people with severe retinal disease such as retinitis pigmentosa. The best-documented example, the Argus retinal prosthesis made by the American company Second Sight Medical Products, works through three parts: a small digital camera mounted on eyeglasses that captures images, a wearable processor that converts the images into signals sent wirelessly to the eye, and an implanted array of sixty electrodes on the retina that stimulates it in a six-by-ten dot grid pattern, letting a user detect edges and general shapes well enough to navigate. Second Sight was founded in Sylmar, California, in 1998, began testing the first Argus device on six people in 2002, tested the improved Argus II in Mexico starting in 2006, won European Union approval in March 2011 and United States FDA approval under a humanitarian device exemption in February 2013; production was discontinued in 2020 and later revived by the successor company Cortigent in 2023.