Oxford student invents artificial retina

An Oxford University student recently created a soft, synthetic tissue retina that could be useful for visually impaired people.

Vanessa Restrepo-Schild, a 24-year-old Dphil student, who performed the research, was the first one to productively use biological, synthetic tissues that were created in a laboratory environment.

This research will be able to modernize the bionic implant industry along with progress of new and less invasive technologies that are similar to human body tissues which will in turn help to cure degenerative eye condition like retinitis pigmentosa, reported Science Daily.

Vanessa, the team leader, generated the double layered synthetic retina which imitates the normal human retinal process. The new discovery includes soft water droplets, known as hydrogels, and few biological cell membrane proteins. The cells’ function is to sense and respond to light in order to form a grey scale image, informed their study published in Scientific Reports.

“The synthetic material can generate electrical signals, which stimulate the neurons at the back of our eye just like the original retina,” described Vanessa.

The cells are made from natural and biodegradable resources that do not contain foreign bodies or any kind of living entities, contrasting from the already existing artificial retinal implants. This technique makes the new implant less invasive as compared to a mechanical devise and also is less probable to contain a bad reaction on the body. “The human eye is incredibly sensitive, which is why foreign bodies like metal retinal implants can be so damaging, leading to inflammation and/or scaring. But a biological synthetic implant is soft and water based, so much more friendly to the eye environment.”

Vanessa continued, “I have taken the principals behind vital bodily functions, e.g. our sense of hearing, touch and the ability to detect light, and replicated them in a laboratory environment with natural, synthetic components. I hope my research is the first step in a journey towards building technology that is soft and biodegradable instead of hard and wasteful.”

Though being tested in laboratory conditions only, Vanessa is looking forward to build on her first work and to look at possible uses with living tissues. This could prove to be important in signifying the performance of the material as a bionic implant.

Daily Mail informed that Vanessa has already filed a patent for this technology and the next step of this will include the team to expand the replica’s function in order to distinguish various colors.

The team desires to carry out animal tests for retina which will later be followed by human clinical trials.