A shard of debris, untreated disease, or any number of things, including age, can damage our eyes permanently, sometimes even making us blind. Unfortunately, the eyes are also some of our most fragile organs. Barring injury, disease, or developmental problems, our eyes take in light, interpret that light, and turn it into useful information.Įyes are obviously key to our sense of sight. The Eye The eye is one of our most amazing organs. As we learn more about it, doctors will be able to help a wider pool of people suffering from various vision problems. While some bionic eyes can give people with certain types of blindness very limited vision back, not unlike seeing flashing lights where objects and movement are, we are a long way from sci-fi cybernetic eyes.įurther study of the eye will improve our understanding of it and how it sends signals to our brain. This could allow us to essentially cure blindness.

Since doctors and scientists understand the eye fairly well, there is some hope we could one day fully build our own device to interface with the brain in the same way. These electrical signals are sent via the optic nerve to the brain’s visual cortex, where the brain then turns those signals into what we see.

The lens of the eye focuses that light onto the retina, which is covered with a series of special photoreceptor cells that turn that light into signals. To see, our cornea refracts incoming light, with the iris controlling the size of the pupil to optimize incoming light as needed.

It consists of the systems needed for the eye to take care of itself (again, barring serious damage) and the ability to move to look at what you want to see. The eye has many parts that work together to provide you with vision.

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