Vision

Since math is a language, there is no reason blind people can't learn it, but math and science textbooks in Braille require an enormous effort to produce. That means much higher cost for a small market, which means it can only be done by nonprofits on one economic end of the scale, or wealthy book companies on the other end, who want to offset their guilt at charging college students $200 for a book that should be $20 on Amazon. A new proof-of-concept approach may be a breakthrough. A new authoring system which serves as a "universal translator" for textbook formats combined with…

Myopia (nearsightedness) is the most frequent cause of correctable visual impairment worldwide.  It occurs when the eye grows too long from front to back (axial length). Instead of focusing images on the retina, images are focused at a point in front of the retina. As a result, people with myopia have good near vision, but poor distance vision that can be corrected with glasses or contact lenses.  Now kids 8-12 have a new option that has been show to slow the progression of myopia at the initiation of treatment. FDA has approved the MiSight contact lens; a single use, disposable,…

In the comics and films, Clark Kent wore reading glasses while Superman had no glasses but sported a lock of hair on his forehead - and no one figured it out. Ridiculous, it was later said. Perhaps it was ridiculous if keen reporters who knew Kent well did not figure it out, but for the most part even subtle disguises work well for most people, according to a new study. Something as minor as complexion changes or a hairstyle are enough to convince people that in a world of six billion people, a one in a million chance of seeing a person who looks like someone you know is not that bad. In the…

I woke up from a nap, on my back, looking up through my bedroom window at a brightly lit blue sky and saw them again: numerous small, uniform dots swimming in my field of view. This time I paid attention. They went right past the images of floaters in my eye. So they are on a different plane. They moved at what seemed like nearly uniform speeds, although they sometimes went in arced trajectories. Each disappeared individually, sometimes seeming to radiate from a point, acting a bit like sparks in fireworks. They all remained in focus. Combined with uniform speed, this suggests they are all…

 If you have seen a face in the clouds or you have been part of a phenomenon called "pareidolia" - a willingness to recognize a non-face object as a human face. Humans sometimes perceive an inherently meaningless object such as a pattern, landscape or object as another object, one that has meaning. It's why alternative science proponents, the Jeffrey Smith's and Pete Myers of the world, believe in spirit photographs.  Some have even argued that pareidolia occurs in relatively low-level visual processing, and a new paper examines the relation between behavior when a face-like object…

Republican candidate Donald Trump and Democratic nominee Senator Hillary Clinton arguing about the colors to wear this evening -and the winner takes the White House. Clinton: All I have to do is divine from what I know of you. Is blue the color of the sort of man who would risk his own presidency, or his enemy's? Now, a clever man would not risk his own presidency, because he would know that only a great fool would risk what he was given. I'm not a great fool, so I can clearly not choose the suit in front of you. But you must have known I was not a great fool; you would have counted on it,…

In comics, Clark Kent looks a lot like Superman, so similar every child has to wonder why no one puts it together. A pair of glasses on Kent, and a small lock of hair on Superman's forehead, are the only differences. Yet that's probably enough, according to a new paper. Small alterations to a person's appearance, such as wearing glasses, can significantly hinder positive facial identification. The psychologists showed participants a number of faces in various 'natural' poses, similar to images seen on Facebook or other social media sites, and asked them to decide whether each pair of images…

Octopuses, squid and other cephalopods are colorblind - their eyes see only black and white - but their weirdly shaped pupils may allow them to detect color and mimic the colors of their background, according to a father/son team of researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, and Harvard University. For decades, biologists have puzzled over the paradox that, despite their brilliantly colored skin and ability to rapidly change color to blend into the background, cephalopods have eyes containing only one type of light receptor, which basically means they see only black and white.…

Nearly half of glaucoma patients don't take their daily prescription eye drops as prescribed, due to forgetfulness or physical limitations like arthritis. However, missing vital doses of glaucoma medication makes these patients vulnerable to increased vision loss and blindness. A medicated silicone ring that rests on the surface of the eye reduced eye pressure in glaucoma patients by about 20 percent over six months, potentially benefiting 3 million people in the United States who have glaucoma. Phase 2 clinical trial results on this technology were published today and the results are…

A diet rich in vitamin C could cut risk of cataract progression by a third, suggests a study being published online today in Ophthalmology. The research is also the first to show that diet and lifestyle may play a greater role than genetics in cataract development and severity. Cataracts occur naturally with age and cloud the eye's lens, turning it opaque. Despite the advent of modern cataract removal surgery, cataracts remain the leading cause of blindness globally. Researchers at King's College London looked at whether certain nutrients from food or supplements could help prevent cataract…