QD Laser (Kanagawa, Japan) and the Institute for Nano Quantum Information Electronics at the University of Tokyo (Tokyo, Japan) have prototyped retina imaging laser eyewear for low-vision care. The team is starting its verification test as low vision aids in collaboration with the department of ophthalmology in medical universities and with educational institutions in Japan. The current plan is to commercialize the low-vision-oriented retina imaging laser eyewear by March 2016.
RELATED ARTICLE: Head-worn displays: useful tool or niche novelty?
The prototype technology is to be exhibited in the 30th Annual International Technology and Persons with Disabilities Conference, which will be held in San Diego, CA from March 4-6 at the Manchester Grand Hyatt Hotel (see http://www.csun.edu/cod/conference/2015/sessions/index.php/public/website_pages/view/1).
This laser eyewear has a miniature laser projector on the frame of the glasses that provides the wearer with digital image information using the retina as a screen. Its LCD-based characteristics include:
--Wide viewing angle
--Small footprint
--High brightness, high color reproducibility, and energy reduction owing to semiconductor lasers as RGB light sources
--Image viewing at any position of the retina
--Focus free, meaning picture clarity is independent of the individual’s visual power
--All optics installed inside the glasses owing to the “focus free” characteristics
QD Laser and the University of Tokyo are planning to verify the performance of the glasses for a variety of eye diseases in collaboration with the department of ophthalmology in medical universities and with educational institutions in Japan. Based on the test results that will clarify the benefits and safety aspects, the team plans to complete the mass-production prototype of low vision aids by September 2015 and to release the commercial product with comfortable hardware, attractive design, and flexible user interface by March 2016.
SOURCE: QD Laser; http://qdlaser.com/cms/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/Press-ReleaseE-Low-Vision-Care-QD-Laser-Inc..pdf
Gail Overton | Senior Editor (2004-2020)
Gail has more than 30 years of engineering, marketing, product management, and editorial experience in the photonics and optical communications industry. Before joining the staff at Laser Focus World in 2004, she held many product management and product marketing roles in the fiber-optics industry, most notably at Hughes (El Segundo, CA), GTE Labs (Waltham, MA), Corning (Corning, NY), Photon Kinetics (Beaverton, OR), and Newport Corporation (Irvine, CA). During her marketing career, Gail published articles in WDM Solutions and Sensors magazine and traveled internationally to conduct product and sales training. Gail received her BS degree in physics, with an emphasis in optics, from San Diego State University in San Diego, CA in May 1986.