Comments on: Are soldiers testing night vision contact lenses?

By: Varifocal Contact Lenses

Varifocal Contact Lenses — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 07:58:00 +0000

pretty amazing thing, didn’t think this kind of things exists

By: Reiko Sarah Guevarra

Reiko Sarah Guevarra — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 00:16:00 +0000

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By: johnnydoeboy

johnnydoeboy — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 14:30:00 +0000

They could just drop sunglasses over their eyes when the lights come on?

By: MPolson

MPolson — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 20:32:00 +0000

There are a number of methods to see at night. Unaided, night adapted eyeballs MK I. Artificial lighting. Image converter tubes with a near infrared light source, which is undetected by the human eye. The longer wavelength IR illumination is focused by optics onto a photocathode, acting as a detector element. This was in use in combat during WW2. It was also used postwar. Image intensifiers, using multiple stages to increase light amplification came next. They could be used with ambient starlight and moonlight. There are a number of successive generations of this technology, with increasing light amplification, usable in lower and lower ambient illumination, and with increasing optical resolution. The latest image intensifier tubes are very, very much better than the crappy intensifiers you can buy at Cabelas, etc. They have longer tube lifetimes, much lower self noise (visible as the speckly crap you can see on some you tube videos), higher quantum efficiency in converting an impacting photon into an electron, much better resolution, longer usable range, and the ability to clamp the high voltage DC power supply when there is a sudden burst of illumination, such as a flashlight being switched on, muzzle flash, tracer rounds, explosions, etc. They are also very, very expensive. The image intensifier tube itself requires a certain length for each intensifier stage, and very high voltages and therefore electric fields are necessary. This technology will not fit in a package the size of a contact lens. The last method of night vision is called imaging infra red. They all “see” the sort of black body long wavelength infrared emissions of objects in their field of view. Differences in temperature show up as differences in brightness of the processed image. There are a number of different implementations, but they all require an infra red imaging optics forming an image on an infra red sensitive detector. Sensitive, low noise detectors tend to have to be cooled to cryogenic temperatures, requiring the detector to be in a dewar, and have a complex, heavy, and large cooling system. These systems tend to be large and heavy, and there is no way in hell they can be hand waved into the physical size of a contact lens by the speculations of people who have no idea what is required to actually achieve night vision.
With all that said, modern US used night vision equipment is pretty good. Of course, some troops are using older, less advanced tubes, and these do have significant limitations compared to what is available to Seals who can simply buy the best available equipment without going through a 20 year procurement cycle.

By: Tom_jones

Tom_jones — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 08:14:00 +0000

You’re a fucking retard! Why you had to bring OS X and all that Apple shit into it…? Retard!

By: First Name

First Name — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 20:05:00 +0000

“this is beyond sci-fi”

“An x64 processor is screaming along at billions of cycles per second to run the XNU kernel which is frantically working through all the POSIX-specified abstraction to create the Darwin system underlying OS X, which in turn is straining itself to run Firefox and its Gecko renderer, which creates a flash object which renders dozens of video frames every second.

Because I wanted to see a cat jump into a box and fall over.

I am a god.”
–XKCD

Nevermind the tens of thousands of other computers that allowed him to do this by way of the internet. No, THIS is beyond sci-fi. This new age we live in that has sprung up around us without us hardly noticing. Isn’t it amazing?

Is it really that far fetched to believe that if we can put 10 billion switches on a one square centimeter piece of glass that we can make a contact lens that lets you see in the dark using optical technology we’ve fully understood for at least the last 50 years?

By: Michael Casper

Michael Casper — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 15:33:00 +0000

I think the power source magnets stuff is probably all just a red herring. It’s unnecessary. It would be much easier to make a contact lens that has a polarized mirror like grating in it which reflects light into the eye if it’s coming at an angle from the side. Then a simple projector could sit under or to the side of the eye and a night vision tube to the side of the head. That way the device is small and not blocking the face or regular vision and it could be turned off. Very simple.

By: Michael Casper

Michael Casper — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 15:33:00 +0000

By: Michael Casper

Michael Casper — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 15:29:00 +0000

You are all imagining this device the wrong way. Instead just imagine the contact as being a polarized mirror which reflects light into the eye if it’s coming at an angle from the side. Then a simple projector could sit under or to the side of the eye and a night vision tube to the side. That way the device is small and not blocking the face or regular vision and it could be turned off. Very simple.

By: Michael Casper

Michael Casper — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 15:29:00 +0000

By: Michael Casper

Michael Casper — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 15:29:00 +0000

By: blue_solace

blue_solace — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 12:05:00 +0000

IIRC, they had some kind of eye tech that already uses some kind of electronics (for some kind of eye trauma) and it is like a contact. Totally unrelated but it could explain how this could work.

FWIW, the “NVGs” that the current military uses only cover one eye, thus allowing for seeing through both night vision or “switching” to your natural vision. I would assume these operate under the same guidelines, which would alleviate that “What if someone turned on the lights?” problem.

By: James Bamkin

James Bamkin — Wed, 29 Jun 2011 10:54:00 +0000

How would this even work I know they had a special stealth helicopter or drone but this is beyond sci-fi. I can comprehend a contact that improves eyesight in the dark, but electronic induction so small it fits in your eye? This is just someones imagination.