Nearly 40% of Americans suffer from vision problems, more specifically short-sightedness or myopia. MIT researchers, along with computer and vision scientists at the University of California at Berkeley, have developed digital display technology that can automatically correct itself to fit your vision. This has the potential to help millions of people who wear glasses; even those with such complex vision problems that glasses don't help them. Lead researcher Ramesh Raskar said, “We now live in a world where displays are ubiquitous, and being able to interact with displays is taken for granted”. By distorting the image in a way that creates a sharper appearance to the particular viewer, non-intrusive computation is what corrects the vision, not optics.

The technology works by sending slightly different images to different parts of each pupil. The teams used algorithms to “direct the intensity of light from a single pixel in an image and then, through a process called deconvolution, aimed the light through a thin plastic pinhole filter to enhance the sharpness of the image”. The system's software alters the light from each individual pixel on the screen based on the person's glasses prescription. When the intended user looks at the screen, the image appears sharp to that particular viewer. If someone else were to look at the image, it would look bad (or completely different), depending on their eyes. To check the images, the researchers used a digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) camera to simulate a person with farsightedness.

They developed a working prototype based on an iPad Touch tablet display that can compensate for individual vision problems. This isn't the first project that attempted to use computer screens to correct vision problems, but offers “significantly higher contrast and resolution compared to previous solutions”. The team hopes this technology can be adapted into a screen protector that could be added to any existing device, allowing the software to be modified for different operating systems. Hopefully we will see it on Kindles and other tablets one day. Eye-tracking tech would need some improvement in order for the displays to keep track of the user's head and be able to adapt to its movements. The prototype will be presented at the International Conference and Exhibition on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques in Vancouver on August 12.