Picture: WICAB - Original Article from Scientic American / Mandy KendrickScience can be so mesmerising! I just read an article about a new device that allows blind people to see by connecting a little camera with their tongue!
The camera (placed on a pair of sunglasses) records light signals from the environment, which are translated via a little handheld device and then transferred to a little tongue piece. The nerve centres in the tongue translate these electric signals which then somehow arrive in the brain so that the blind perceive them as visual information - they see!
Apparently it feels like a champagne tickle on the tongue. The whole process is like when a baby learns to see the world around it for the first time - and only takes a few days.
The device is ready to be sold by the end of this year! Wow!