Shawn Kelly, a senior systems scientist at Carnegie Mellon University,
has developed a computer chip that translates camera images into
electrical pulses that the nerves inside the brain can understand. The
result is vision. The cameras are incredibly small and mounted
to a pair of glasses. The digital information picked up from the camera
is sent along a wire to a thin film surgically implanted in the back of
the patient's eye, between the sclera and the retina. The electrical
signals stimulate the nerves in the retina, and that allows the patient
to see. The system is powered via induction -- not much current is
necessary since the electric field doesn't have to penetrate far into
the head
