Progress in Augmented Reality Contact Lenses

Article: Mojo Vision crams its contact lens with AR display, processor and wireless tech
Source: CNET, via EyeWire News
Published: August 24, 2021

CMOS backbone of the electronic display

A start-up company, Mojo Vision, recently announced progress in the design of augmented reality (AR) displays embedded into contact lenses, adding a layer of information onto real world images. Although a long ways from clinical implementation or hitting the shelves, the Mojo Lens boasts features such as a hexagonal display less than a millimeter wide, with pixels each merely a quarter of the width of a red blood cell, and a "femtoprojector" that beams images directly onto the central retina. Electronic features include a camera that captures the outside world; a computer chip that processes imagery, controls the display, and communicates wirelessly with external devices; a motion tracker that incorporates accelerometer and gyroscope technology to compensate for eye movement, and a wirelessly charging battery. Current challenges include extending battery life and "making these things small enough to be socially acceptable," since social discomfort related to recording and sharing information were problems encountered by earlier AR systems such as the Google Glass eyeglasses. When asked why they chose contact lenses as an AR display technology, the start-up emphasizes that contact lenses are worn by 150 million people worldwide, they are lightweight and don't fog up, and AR technology on contact lenses would work even with the eyes closed. At this stage, the team reports that prototypes have passed toxicology tests and they have all the hardware and software components to start assembling fully featured prototypes.

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