Newly published research details how a team of scientists from the John A. Moran Eye Center at the University of Utah and Spain’s Miguel Hernandez University successfully created a form of artificial vision for a blind woman using a prosthesis hardwired into her brain.
Publishing in The Journal of Clinical Investigation, Moran researcher Richard A. Norman and Spanish collaborator Eduardo Fernández detail how the Moran|Cortices Prosthesis produced a simple form of vision for 60-year- old Bern a Gómez.
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The Utah Electrode Array is 4 mm by 4 mm and has 100 micro electrodes, each 1.5 mm long, that can both record and replay the electrical activities of neurons communicating in the brain. Image credit: University of Utah
The team conducted a series of experiments with Gómez for six months in Each, Spain, that represent a leap forward for scientists hoping to create a visual prosthesis that could increase independence for the blind.
A neurosurgeon implanted a micro electrode array invented by Norman, the Utah Electrode Array (USA), into the visual cortex of Gómez to record and stimulate the electrical activities of neurons.
Gómez wore eyeglasses equipped with a miniature video camera; specialized software encoded the visual data collected by the camera and sent it to the USA. The array then stimulated neurons to produce phosphines, perceived by Gómez as white points of light, to create an image.
Bern Gómez of Spain spent six months working with researchers to test an experimental visual prosthesis which used an electrode array implanted into her brain’s visual cortex. Gómez has been fully blind for more than 18 years. Image credit: John A. Moran Eye Center at the University of state
Science teacher fully blind for 16 years at the time of the experiments, Gómez had no complications from the surgery and researchers determined that the USA did not impair the function of neurons in proximity to the electrodes or affect the function of the underlying cortex. Gómez was able to identify lines, shapes and simple letters evoked by different patterns of stimulation.
To help her practice using the prosthesis, researchers created a video game for Gómez to play using a character from the popular television show The Simpsons. Thanks to her precise descriptions of visual perceptions and importance to the research, Gómez is a co-author on the study.
In some experiments, researchers made electron physiological recordings like this one below during electrical stimulation via the Utah Electrode Array. Overall, 74.7% of stimulation trials that evoked an increase in the activity recorded around the electrodes (either by stimulating a single electrode or several electrodes simultaneously) were associated with a reported visual perception.
“These results are very exciting because they demonstrate both safety and efficacy,” said Fernández, who has collaborated with Norman for more than 30 years and is an adjunct professor at Moran. “We have taken a significant step forward, showing the potential of these types of devices to restore functional vision for people who have lost their vision.”
Norman and colleague Gregory Clark first used the USA in amputees to evaluate its safety and efficacy. The USA allowed the amputees to control artificial limbs simply with their desire to move a finger or hand. The Spain experiments were the first to implant the USA into the visual cortex.
The team’s neurosurgeon placed just one 4 mm by 4 mm USA in Gómez’s brain, but published research conducted by Norman indicates between seven and 10 arrays in the visual cortex, working together, could produce more detailed images for useful vision. University of Utah neurosurgeons and neuroscientists John D. Bolton and Tyler Davis collaborated on the research.
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