Week in review: Smart glasses, electric color, beauty lashes

A weekly roundup of ophthalmic news from around the web.

Scientist from Korea have developed multifunctional smart glasses using a 3D printer. Their device can not only monitor a person’s brain waves and body movements, but also functions as sunglasses and allow users to play video games using eye motions. Unlike other models of e-glasses that are often rigid, these glasses utilize soft, conductive electrodes that wirelessly monitor brain and eye signals, UV intensity and body movements. Their findings, which were published in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, indicate e-glasses have the potential to be useful in digital healthcare or virtual reality applications. ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces

Zeteo Biomedical’s multidose ophthalmic drug delivery system is now available, the company announced in a press release. The credit card-sized device holds a multidose cartridge and dispenses a sterile and precise spray of a drug. Additional features include an automatic dose counter and a battery-free operation. The company says that the ZEOx1 AquilaMD system can hold topical treatments for ocular diseases such as glaucoma, dry eye, macular degeneration, presbyopia, infections and ocular inflammation. Zeteo Biomedical

A case study is reporting a surprising side effect from electroconvulsive therapy (ECT): improved color perception. The patient was a 30-year-old with red-green color blindness and mental health issues. She underwent 26 sessions of ECT after medical therapy failed to improve her condition. In the hours following the procedure, she reported that all colors appeared stronger and brighter, coinciding with an improvement on Ishihara tests. The enhancement was temporary, however; her vision returned to its habitual state by the following morning. Brain Stimulation

Neither Stargardt disease nor a pandemic can stop world champion paraclimber Abbie Robinson from getting her college degree. Undeterred, the 17-year-old is using the OrCam MyEye2 device to gain independence and continue her studies at Leeds University. Affixed to her glasses, the device uses AI to read text aloud and has facial recognition capabilities. But the device can’t really help Abbie with her rock climbing, unfortunately. “It’s not really built for that,” she told Forbes. “What it has helped me with is supporting me in everyday life, which then has a knock-on effect with my climbing. So it speeds up my work, which makes me more efficient, which has enabled me to get a much better work-training balance.” Forbes

Beauty lovers rejoice, you can now purchase ophthalmologist-approved lash extensions. They’re available from Opulence MD, a brand developed by Anika Goodwin, MD, a board-certified oculoplastic surgeon and newly minted beauty entrepreneur. Goodwin, who damaged her own natural lashes from extensions, experimented with all types of lashes before settling on magnetic lashes made from mink—which are light on eyelids and avoid the need for adhesives that can sometimes contain formaldehyde. “I set out to basically solve those issues for myself and in doing so decided that other women like me, busy professional women, would benefit from the same thing. So I decided to do it on a much larger scale,” she told Black Enterprise. Black Enterprise