[EchoStorm @ Dec 19th 2005 1:23AM]

Not to rain on anyone's parade here, but I'm having trouble determining exactly how far along IIP is on this track. Their latest press release (http://www.iip-tec.com/pdf/Medienmitteilung%20241104_E_1.pdf) is skimpy on the details, and the information that is given has already been shown by other groups. Furthermore, their own web site states, "The learning Retinal Implant is still being studied in clinical trials and is not yet available commercially," so I'm not sure what triggered the "first to commercialize" reference in this post.

In any case, there are several companies (SecondSight comes to mind, http://www.2-sight.com) working toward this end, and I don't see any clear leader emerging just yet. And yes, while people have had this concept and technology for a while, from someone working in the field . . . trust me, you do not want anyone implanting these devices into you in their current state. Besides the fact they, in fact, haven't improved terribly from the 8x8 resolution mentioned earlier (16x16 now, reproducibly), safety issues are emerging in the form that simultaneous stimulation of neighboring areas of visual cortex (I realize IIP's device stimulates the optic nerve) results in epileptic seizures.

Unless IIP's R&D is light years ahead of the published literature on this topic, it's going to be at least 10 years before we see anything like this come to market, and as much as the researchers who are tackling this problem and the patients who would benefit from it would like it to be sooner, I just don't see that happening.