For people living with dry age-related macular degeneration, or dry AMD, losing the ability to read can feel like the world slowly closing in. The disease erases central vision, leaving only blurry edges, and until now, there hasn’t been any way to reverse that damage. But a groundbreaking new AI-powered implant is changing everything. For the first time, patients who were completely blind in one eye are reading again, not with glasses or drugs, but with a tiny microchip and smart glasses working together like an artificial eye.
According to a clinical trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine, doctors tested the system, known as PRIMA, on 38 patients across 17 hospitals in five countries. These were people who couldn’t even see the largest letters on an eye chart. After surgery and months of training, 84 percent of participants regained the ability to read letters, numbers, and even full words. On average, they managed to read five extra lines on a vision chart – a result researchers called “life-changing”, as reported by Live Science.
The secret is a wafer-thin chip, just two millimeters across and about half the thickness of a human hair. Surgeons slide it under the retina in a quick two-hour procedure, replacing the part of the eye that no longer detects light. About a month later, patients wear AI-enabled smart glasses with a built-in camera connected to a tiny computer. The computer processes what the camera sees, converts it into infrared signals, and beams them to the chip inside the eye. That chip turns the signal into electrical impulses, sending them through the optic nerve to the brain, effectively teaching it to see again.
The brain, of course, needs time to learn this new language of light. Each patient in the study went through weeks of training to scan, focus, and recognize shapes. The vision isn’t identical to natural sight – it’s more like grayscale outlines – but for those who had only darkness before, it’s revolutionary. One patient, Sheila Irvine, described it as “having two black discs turn into words again.”
Researchers say the breakthrough doesn’t harm the remaining peripheral vision that dry AMD patients still rely on, making it safer than many earlier experimental implants. Dr. Mahi Muqit of the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology, who led the U.K. part of the trial, called it “the first real restoration of meaningful central vision.”
The PRIMA chip isn’t on the market yet, but the success of the study suggests commercial rollout could come soon. For millions who have forgotten what reading felt like, a small chip powered by AI might just bring that joy back – one word at a time.