TechKnow - New eyes for the blind скачать в хорошем качестве

TechKnow - New eyes for the blind

This week on TechKnow, we are in the operating room with patient Lisa Kulik who is about to be fitted with a bionic eye, an implant which could enable her to see again. The device is called an Argus II. "This device doesn't work on all types of blindness," explains Dr Mark Humayun, the co-inventor. "You need to have at least 10 percent of your optic nerve intact, because it needs the optic nerve to send the signal to the brain." The Argus II is implanted directly onto the eye and can help a patient with degenerative eye disease to see shapes, outlines and partial images. Also on TechKnow: Researcher Mark Hoddle from the Center for Invasive Species Research is attempting to introduce a parasitic wasp from Pakistan to deal with a disease that is destroying orange crops in southern California, US. The disease, citrus greening, is spread by a tiny bug called the Asian citrus psyllid. By bringing in a parasitic wasp from Pakistan, which preys on the psyllids, farmers are hoping to bring citrus greening under control and save their crops. But could introducing yet another foreign insect into the Californian ecosystem have unintended consequences? The TechKnow team has some good news from the shark conservation front. The white shark population off the coast of California is much healthier than originally thought. Scientists involved in the study say that efforts to protect the shark's food supply, as well as amped up efforts to prevent people killing sharks has resulted in the much larger and healthier population.