Autofocals: gaze-contingent eyeglasses for presbyopes

Abstract

Presbyopia, the loss of accommodation due to the stiffening of the crystalline lens, affects nearly 20% of the population worldwide. Traditional forms of presbyopia correction use fixed focal elements that inherently trade off field of view or stereo vision for a greater range of distances at which the wearer can see clearly. However, none of these offer the same natural refocusing enjoyed in youth. In this work, we built a new presbyopia correction, dubbed Autofocals, which externally mimics the natural accommodation response by combining data from eye trackers and a depth sensor, and then automatically drives focus-tunable lenses. In our testing, wearers generally reported that the Autofocals compare favorably with their own current corrective eyewear.