Bad eyesight? There's an app for that

(Getty Images)

Eyes suffer from looking at computer screens. There’s a name for it, Computer Vision Syndrome, and the American Optometric Association says that more than two continuous hours of staring at a monitor can damage your eyesight. Sadly, as a glasses-wearer will tell you, once eyes go bad they don’t often revert to 20:20.

Which is where the UltimEyes app comes in. It won’t cure the blind. In fact, it doesn’t work on the eyes at all, but on the brain cortex that processes vision. Like brain-training memory games, the app puts your eyes through a work-out – which may strain them at first – with the end result being better vision.

The results of an experiment on baseball players are published in Current Biology this month. Though the study design has been criticised, players “reported seeing the ball better, greater peripheral vision and an ability to distinguish lower-contrast objects”, said the neuroscientist who created the app.

Check out the video below for more.