/ News
Telescope eye implant restores sight in macular degeneration patients
It sounds like science fiction: Tiny telescopes being implanted into the eyes of humans to restore sight in those with age-related macular degeneration (AMD).
But it’s actually happening in operating rooms across the country.
AMD is the leading cause of blindness in the United States, affecting 10 million Americans over age 60. It’s a condition where the central part of the retina wears out, causing vision loss. Everyone is at risk for macular degeneration as they age, but people who have a family history or who smoke are more likely to develop it.
Although there is no cure for AMD, there is a procedure which helps end-stage disease sufferers by implanting a microscopic telescope into the eye.
"This is a telescopic implant – a very tiny telescope that is implanted in the eye when the lens is removed. This takes the place of the individual's own lens and remains in the eye permanently," Dr. Sid Mandelbaum, an ophthalmologist at East Side Eye Surgeons in New York City, told Fox News.
The procedure takes a little more than an hour, and once the patient has the implant, the telescope magnifies the images a patient sees and projects them. After surgery, patients undergo occupational therapy to help them get used to their new vision.
"The eye is kind of like the video camera that sends the image to the brain,” said Mandelbaum. “The brain is the central processor that integrates everything, and so we are retraining our brain to learn to use this vision that's a little bit different than the vision that we have used all of our lives up until this point."
The procedure does not restore patients’ sight to the level it was before they developed AMD. The eye telescope is designed to improve functional capabilities like recognizing facial detail, reading signs and allowing patients to see where they are going. However, experts warn it’s not the kind of vision that would allow a patient suffering with AMD to drive again.
To qualify for the procedure, patients need to be at least 75 years old, have end-stage macular degeneration in both eyes, and have at least one eye that has not undergone cataract surgery.
For Patricia Gajewski, who received the telescope implant in early 2013, the results have been life changing.
"It's not 100 percent, but it is better – I can tell,” Gajewski told Fox News. “I can walk into a room and recognize some faces; I am not afraid to be social. I was afraid to go out by myself. I was afraid to cross the street and everything like that, but now I can cross the street. I can go shopping by myself.”
"[My mother] can maintain herself in her house, by doing her everyday things that we take for granted, like cooking, like sewing, like cutting the grass,” said Gajewski’s daughter, Linda Tesesco. “You know, the doorbell rings and she now can see and identify who's at the door."
The telescope implant is FDA approved and is available nationwide.
Source: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2014/01/12/telescope-eye-implant-restores-sight-in-macular-degeneration-patients/
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Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.
The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies.
The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.
A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.
The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.
An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.
Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society
2015-2020
The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.
2020-2025
Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning bodily life. Such technologies will greatly enlarge the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make all kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.
2030-2035
Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence, expand human capabilities and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times. The final result at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.
2045
This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive! Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.
Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots will become affordable and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however: humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover, prerequisites for a large-scale expansion into outer space will be created as well.
Key elements of the project in the future
• International social movement
• social network immortal.me
• charitable foundation "Global Future 2045" (Foundation 2045)
• scientific research centre "Immortality"
• business incubator
• University of "Immortality"
• annual award for contribution to the realization of the project of "Immortality”.
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