There are quite a few scientists who want to get electronic signals that permit sight to the brains of blind people. Some are working on the eye, installing sensors that turn light into electrical impulses that hit the optic nerve and at the same time stimulate the part of the brain on which sight depends. Others are concentrating on the brain, where they are implanting electrodes that receive the filmed images from videocameras built into the eye sockets of patients. Thanks to these technologies, some blind people are today in the process of seeing shadows and forms, even if they’ll never truly regain their sight. But Tanya understood that none of these experiments, for all their advances, does anything for her; she remembers that “operating on the optic nerve means risking losing sight even in the eye that’s still functioning.”
While she was carrying out her own research, Vlach met Kevin Kelly, one of the founders of “Wired” magazine, who encouraged her to use the power of the Internet to plan her bionic eye in open source, a collective work similar to that which provided the coding for the Linux operating system. The first session of engineers took place over the Internet last November, and in a few weeks Tanya was inundated with suggestions. “I think it may be possible to insert a memory card as well, perhaps dividing the prosthesis into two parts for the sake of comfort,” Guy Jin wrote. Oskar was more cautious: “There’s no room for it; the only solution that I can imagine is to put the videocamera in the eyeball and then have a wire that comes out of the eye; obviously, this will seem a little strange.”
After all that, the person Vlach ended up choosing to construct her bionic eye was Frank Oliver, who four years ago founded Artisan Robotics, a firm in Texas specializing in robotics equipment, used by the Pentagon, among other clients. Oliver is convinced that Tanya’s ocular prosthesis could contain not only a videocamera but also a wireless system for the transfer of images to a computer or hard disk.
An early version of the bionic eye will be ready next November, when Tanya participates in an installation of the Biennial of New York: “Some actors will read from the diary of Tina Modotti (an Italian actress and photographer who was one of the muses of Mexican painter Diego Rivera), while I go around the room filming the event with my eye.”
It’s possible that the first generation of ocular videocameras will be capable only of rudimentary short films. And nobody said that the group of engineers under Oliver’s guidance will successfully resolve all the problems associated with the project, from the weight of the bionic eye. But on this point, Vlach is also interested in another thing: “Asking for help over the Internet was also tremendously important in helping me accept my situation,” she relates. “I’ve received dozens of e-mails from people who like me have lost an eye, and they all told me how it happened. And I’ve discovered that the only way to overcome a trauma like this is to relive the story of my own disability, but imagining a different ending to the story. After all, this is what I’m trying to do with my project.”
Tanya is a little bit bionic already: some titanium plates were inserted underneath the skin of her cheeks. Various treatments aid her facial nerves in recovering their sensitivity and her memory in filling in the gaps that became more frequent after her accident. In order to help herself, she also has been writing a book about the experiment, which starts with the twenty-one things that she’d like to achieve soon. Number four is falling in love, and number six is helping the disabled. And then she’s like to meet the farmer who saved her life, have children, dance the salsa in Cuba, move to another house… The last item on the list is that from which the title will come: “21: build a new eye.”
There are quite a few scientists who want to get electronic signals that permit sight to the brains of blind people. Some are working on the eye, installing sensors that turn light into electrical impulses that hit the optic nerve and at the same time stimulate the part of the brain on which sight depends. Others are concentrating on the brain, where they are implanting electrodes that receive the filmed images from videocameras built into the eye sockets of patients. Thanks to these technologies, some blind people are today in the process of seeing shadows and forms, even if they’ll never truly regain their sight. But Tanya understood that none of these experiments, for all their advances, does anything for her; she remembers that “operating on the optic nerve means risking losing sight even in the eye that’s still functioning.”
While she was carrying out her own research, Vlach met Kevin Kelly, one of the founders of “Wired” magazine, who encouraged her to use the power of the Internet to plan her bionic eye in open source, a collective work similar to that which provided the coding for the Linux operating system. The first session of engineers took place over the Internet last November, and in a few weeks Tanya was inundated with suggestions. “I think it may be possible to insert a memory card as well, perhaps dividing the prosthesis into two parts for the sake of comfort,” Guy Jin wrote. Oskar was more cautious: “There’s no room for it; the only solution that I can imagine is to put the videocamera in the eyeball and then have a wire that comes out of the eye; obviously, this will seem a little strange.”
After all that, the person Vlach ended up choosing to construct her bionic eye was Frank Oliver, who four years ago founded Artisan Robotics, a firm in Texas specializing in robotics equipment, used by the Pentagon, among other clients. Oliver is convinced that Tanya’s ocular prosthesis could contain not only a videocamera but also a wireless system for the transfer of images to a computer or hard disk.
An early version of the bionic eye will be ready next November, when Tanya participates in an installation of the Biennial of New York: “Some actors will read from the diary of Tina Modotti (an Italian actress and photographer who was one of the muses of Mexican painter Diego Rivera), while I go around the room filming the event with my eye.”
It’s possible that the first generation of ocular videocameras will be capable only of rudimentary short films. And nobody said that the group of engineers under Oliver’s guidance will successfully resolve all the problems associated with the project, from the weight of the bionic eye. But on this point, Vlach is also interested in another thing: “Asking for help over the Internet was also tremendously important in helping me accept my situation,” she relates. “I’ve received dozens of e-mails from people who like me have lost an eye, and they all told me how it happened. And I’ve discovered that the only way to overcome a trauma like this is to relive the story of my own disability, but imagining a different ending to the story. After all, this is what I’m trying to do with my project.”
Tanya is a little bit bionic already: some titanium plates were inserted underneath the skin of her cheeks. Various treatments aid her facial nerves in recovering their sensitivity and her memory in filling in the gaps that became more frequent after her accident. In order to help herself, she also has been writing a book about the experiment, which starts with the twenty-one things that she’d like to achieve soon. Number four is falling in love, and number six is helping the disabled. And then she’s like to meet the farmer who saved her life, have children, dance the salsa in Cuba, move to another house… The last item on the list is that from which the title will come: “21: build a new eye.”