Artificial vision system

Abstract

A miniaturized body electronic implant for providing artificial vision to a blind person or for other uses as neuromuscular sensors and microstimulators. The implant has a high resolution electrode array connected to a chip integrating implant stimulation and monitoring circuits, mounted on the back of the electrode array. The implant is powered by and communicates with an external unit through an inductive bi-directional link.

1 . An artificial vision system for stimulating a visual cortex of a blind person, comprising: 
 a body implant including an electrode array having multiple adjacent electrodes applicable against the visual cortex of the blind person, and a micro-stimulator means mounted on a back side of the electrode array, for selectively generating stimulation signals on the electrodes producing phosphenes on the visual cortex representing an artificial image in response to airwave-received implant control signals; and    an external unit including an image sensor adapted to take a real scene image, an image processor and command generator means connected to the image sensor for processing image data signals produced by the image sensor in accordance with predetermined processing operations and generating implant compatible stimulation commands causing the body implant to produce the artificial image on the visual cortex corresponding to the real scene image, and a transceiver circuit connected to the image processor and command generator means, for producing airwave-transmitted implant control signals carrying the stimulation commands, the processing operations including a digitalization of the image data signals to form a digital image, an image reduction of the digital image into a scaled down image having a same resolution as the electrode array, and an image enhancement of the scaled down image to form an enhanced image corresponding to the artificial image produced by the implant unit and from which the stimulation commands are generated.    
   
   
       2 . The artificial vision system according to  claim 1 , wherein the image reduction comprises a determination of an average light intensity on complementary areas of the digital image covering a predetermined number of adjacent pixels, each one of the areas corresponding to one of the electrodes of the electrode array, the stimulation commands being produced as a function of the average light intensity.  
   
   
       3 . The artificial vision system according to  claim 2 , wherein the image enhancement comprises a linear histogram equalization of the scaled down image based on maximum and minimum pixel intensities detected in the scaled down image.