I have just finished watching RoboCop on a legit channel – at a cinema, of course, and the question of fusing human as well as robot parts together continues to be an interesting aspect that might very well be the future if science manages to catch up with fiction. In fact, surgeons over at the University of Michigan Health System might have taken the first step in the right direction after managing to develop a customized DNA chip known as a microarray which will be able to help diagnose eye disorders, while having successfully performed their first ever surgery which involves implanting artificial retinas into the eyes of patients who suffer from retinitis pigmentosa, which happens to be a degenerative eye disease that will eventually lead to blindness if nothing is done.
The formal name of this surgical procedure would be the Argus II Retinal Prosthesis System, where the bionic eye device itself was developed by California-based Second Sight Medical Products, Inc. Thiran Jayasundera and David N. Zacks, professors of ophthalmology and visual sciences at the University’s Kellogg Eye Center. Needless to say, this unique bionic eye device had already gained approval from the Food and Drug Administration in 2013, hence making it possible for this implant to happen.
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