Soon, the concept of the Bionic Woman may not be solely fictitious.

Several engineers at the University of Washington are developing biologically safe contact lenses that are imprinted with electronic circuits and lights.

The contact lenses would be fitted with numerous small electronic and mechanical devices to, among other things, ideally enhance human vision.

“Our ultimate vision is to develop contact lenses that incorporate a number of different functions,” said Babak Parviz, a UW assistant professor of electrical engineering. “We have taken a few critical steps forward along this path and the results look very promising.”

The prototype contact lenses do not correct the wearer’s vision, but the technique could be used on a corrective lens, Parviz said.

“Looking through a completed lens, you would see what the display is generating, superimposed on the world outside,” he said.

The contact lenses would be fitted with biological sensors, which will help in monitoring the health of the wearer.

The displays that are built into these contact lenses would be used, among other things, for the augmentation of gaming and mobile computing. This would make these lenses usable for many individuals, once they are ready for mass production, Parviz said.

“As for the displays, I think if we are successful in building them, they will answer one of the major issues of mobile computing, which is small display size,” he said.

Junior Kate Giannoulas said she would feel uncomfortable wearing electronically enhanced lenses if they were available to the public.

“I would feel like a robot, like the Terminator or something,” she said. “I already don’t like wearing my contact lenses as they are, with dust or dirt getting underneath them.”

Giannoulas was also uncomfortable that the lenses were tested on animals.

Researchers have been able to show that lenses with micro-electrical interconnects can be safely worn by a rabbit for up to 20 minutes without any observable adverse effect.

Although the research and development thus far is promising, the lenses are far from being accessible to the general public, Parviz said.

Biology major Ben Wilson said the idea behind the lenses sounded interesting.

“If they could figure out a way to hook it up to Google Maps or a similar service, it’d be great,” he wrote in an e-mail. “I’m really curious what they’ll use for an interface. It’s not like a user would be able to click on things with their eyes. Maybe you’ll have to carry around a little touch pad.”

Parviz said installing or removing the lenses would be just as easy as wearing a normal contact lens. In other words, the wearer would not notice that they are wearing any sort of device.

According to a UW press release, however, manufacturing these lenses has proven quite difficult, as materials that are safe for use in the body, such as those used in contact lenses, are extremely delicate.

Despite these barriers, Parviz said that the long-term aspects of this technology are promising.

“We are hoping that building functional contact lenses will become an active field of research,” Parviz said. “People may find all sorts of applications for it that we have not thought about. Our goal is to demonstrate the basic technology and make sure it works and that it’s safe.”

[Reach reporter Chris Heide at news@thedaily.washington.edu.]