Scientists invent micrometers-thin battery charged by saline solution that could power smart contact lenses::Scientists from NTU Singapore have developed a flexible battery as thin as a human cornea, which stores electricity when it is immersed in saline solution, and which could one day power smart contact lenses.

  • Solumbran@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Who doesn’t want everything you see to be recorded, all while getting an ad overlay directly over your eyes?

      • dangblingus@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        How? Bionic ocular implants already exist. A contact lens is not going to be able to restore sight to the blind.

        • GreenBottles@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          perhaps not to the totally blind but to those that have degenerative diseases contact lenses absolutely can help

        • Zron@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Now you can see your friends dying in the next room, instead of just hearing it!

          Or if it’s only a map, now you can see how surrounded your unit is!

          This is valuable tactical data, surely it won’t cause any morale issues.

          • Kungolicious@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            It’s true. All new inventions have a morality issue to them. And those moralities need to be weighed heavily before implementing them.

            But it can also be used to guide a secluded operative back to his troop. It can be used to detect road mines that otherwise would have exploded.

            New technology is just a tool. It’s the people choosing how to use it that makes it moral/immoral.

            • Zron@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Listen, all I’m saying is if I was surrounded by enemy combatants on all sides, I wouldn’t want to have to see that while getting shot at.

              Also wouldn’t want to see a fellow soldier get gunned down in a little twitch.tv window in my eye while I’m trying to clear a room.

              I’d call that a major distraction. And distractions in combat get people killed when otherwise they might have lived.

              Maybe smart contacts would have some use for NCOs, even then, a tablet or something with the same info would be just as useful and less likely to block vision. Giving it to everybody would just cause panic and confusion on a battlefield.

        • JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Some “blind” people do have data coming in, it’s just so blurry/skewed that it’s worthless. It might be possible to fix this but it would be a case by case basis and likely very expensive. Not all blindness is a world of black

          • Lazerbeams2@ttrpg.network
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            1 year ago

            Even totally blind people can usually detect light as painful, slightly less dark darkness. That’s actually why so many wear dark sunglasses

      • Goblin_Mode@ttrpg.network
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        1 year ago

        Saline is what you are supposed to wash your eyes out with when you get something in them in addition to being what contacts are stored in every night

      • BarrelAgedBoredom@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Saline is isotonic and, short of a large electrolyte imbalance, shouldn’t cause any/very little irritation to your eyes. And if you’re hyponatremic to the point of saline solution causing eye irritation, you have much more immediate and life threatening problems to attend to than risnsing your peepers out

  • FluffyToaster621@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Very cool technological achievement, but eye-batteries don’t necessarily sound all that safe, non-corrosive/toxic or not, it’s still a constant reaction to create and store electricity in a very vulnerable location.

  • Dizzy Devil Ducky@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Great. Hopefully by the time smart contact lenses come out (if ever) I’ll be dead so I don’t have to worry about another tool that can be used to spy on you for not only the government but for the large tech companies looking for the most intrusive ways to steal your info on the daily.

  • jBlight@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Would you be able to close your eyes to not see anything/ads? I don’t know much about the tech, but I would assume a light is being emitted from the contact lenses and since that’s behind your eye lids…

    • Taringano@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      Of course you can close your eyes and turn off ads for as low as $19.99/mo