Thread: Blind man sees with his tongue

British Soldier Blinded In Iraq Is Taught To 'See' With His Tongue Using Revolutionary New Device | UK News | Sky News

A British soldier who lost his sight in Iraq is being taught to 'see' with his tongue, using a revolutionary new device.

Craig Lundberg, 24, who was blinded in a rocket-propelled grenade attack three years ago, is the first British soldier to test the BrainPort system.

The device consists of a high-tech 'lollipop' that rests on Craig's tongue. It converts images from a video camera, that he wears on a pair of glasses, into signals that stimulate electrodes on the lollipop.

The £10,000 device works on the principle of sensory substitution. The brain recognises that the signals stimulating the tongue have nothing to do with taste, and re-routes them to the visual centre of the brain for processing.

The brain is able to interpret the image, giving Craig rudimentary vision.

He described the device as "absolutely fantastic".

"Whatever the camera is looking at, I can feel the image on my tongue," he said.

The system has allowed him to make out the top letters on an optician's eye test.

He said: "I could feel with my tongue that the first letter was an A, and then I moved on to the next one. It was amazing.

"Then I walked down a corridor and I could make out the doorways, the walls and people coming towards me."

Was just watching this on the BBC news, quite fascinating, said something about only being at 400 pixels at the moment but hoping to increase it to 4000 in the near future, improving his vision a lot more.

BBC News - New glasses allow blind soldier to 'see' with his tongue

Wow, that really is amazing!