CNBC

Smart contact genus Lens may have take a step closer to becoming realness with the conception of a wafer - thin battery with a highly unusual fashion of recharge . The battery is just 0.2 millimetre thick , or twice the width of a string of hair , so it fits inside a standard inter-group communication lens system that measures around 0.5 millimetre chummy . The sparse profile means it wo n’t interfere with comfort or fit , and it will have the ability to recharge using your split .

The battery is the body of work of Lee Seok Woo , a scientist and associate prof at Nanyang Technological University ’s School of electric and electronic Engineering in Singapore , who was apparently inspired to start the undertaking by the wise contact lens lens envisage in theMission : Impossible – Ghost Protocolmovie from 2011 .

A thin battery inside a contact lens.

CNBC

But it ’s not just an fantastically slight battery cell that makes us all tingly at the prognosis — it ’s the fashion it ’s powered and recharged that get us properly excited . Lee toldCNBCthe battery is powered using a “ biocompatible saline solution solution , ” rather than it being a Li - ion cell like the ones in phones and smartwatches , as this would be unsafe for a product like a contact lens . Although the barrage fire can be recharge using wires , just like normal batteries , a glucose coating around the genus Lens reacts when it is submerged in a saline solution , stimulate it to charge up . Anyone who wears contact lens lenses now will be intimate with the process of lay in lenses this room already , and it appears a similar method acting could be employ to charge future fresh versions too .

Recharged by your tears

But that ’s not the only way to charge up the Lens , as Lee says they can also be charged while in your eye , due toour tearscontaining glucose . That ’s correct , the more you cry out , the more your smart contact genus Lens battery will reload . That ’s trusted to make for an interesting advertising campaign when release time comes . Do n’t expect it to be power any contact genus Lens before long though . At the moment , the assault and battery is a work in progress and only lasts for a few hours on a single charge . And its power output is n’t enough to have a wireless connection or power any onboard repositing , which would be all-important for overbold eyewear .

The development of a tiny , superthin barrage fire is another step onward in the quest to create a pair of smart striking lens system . We ’ve been discover and hearing about chic contact lens technology for many twelvemonth , including other version made with lens expert Bausch + Lomb andshown during CES 2021 , and versionsmade for aesculapian purposestoo . It ’s not the first time scientists have claimed to be inspired by Mission : Impossible either , as a prof from Nanjing Universitycited the same moviewhile discussing a set of battery - detached eye - trailing smart electron lens this twelvemonth .

While we look for smart inter-group communication lens system , take a look at theRay - Ban Meta smartglasses , one of thebest smart eyewear product we ’ve try . You have to use a USB C cable to reload them though .