Lions, giraffes, tigers, rabbits, bears, rhinos and even owls can go blind from cataracts, but an east German firm has an answer: custom-made "contact lenses".
Other
Jul 16, 2009
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(Phys.org) -- Three Chinese scientists, Xia Sheng, Haolin Zhang and Qiang Weng, all from Beijing Forest University, have published a correspondence paper in the science journal Nature, calling for a ban on the practice of ...
Cataracts are the most common eye ailment in humans. However, the exact processes leading to this condition are not fully understood. A team of researchers headed by the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has now discovered ...
Cell & Microbiology
Feb 16, 2021
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177
Cataracts are the leading cause of preventable blindness worldwide. But the standard test to detect the cloudy patches in the eye’s lens requires a $5,000 piece of equipment called a slit lamp, and a trained physician ...
Engineering
Jul 1, 2011
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Researchers are reporting evidence from tissue culture experiments that the popular dietary supplement carnosine may help to prevent and treat cataracts, a clouding of the lens of the eye that is a leading cause of vision ...
Biochemistry
Jul 15, 2009
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Cigarette smoking, forest fires and woodburning can release a chemical that may be at least partly responsible for human health problems related to smoke exposure, according to a new study by NOAA researchers and their colleagues.
Environment
May 16, 2011
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(AP)—A formerly blind Sumatran orangutan can see her baby twins for the first time after undergoing cataract surgery in the first such operation in Indonesia.
Plants & Animals
Aug 31, 2012
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The United Nations treaty to protect the ozone layer signed nearly 25 years ago prevented an environmental disaster, a chief UN scientist said Friday, cautioning though that the Earth's radiation shield is still under threat.
Environment
Sep 14, 2012
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The incidence of cataracts in farmed salmon is on the rise due to vegetable-based feeds, a strong focus on fish growth and warm waters. "This is a condition we can do something about," asserts Sofie Charlotte Remø.
Ecology
Jan 13, 2014
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Scientists are reporting a scientific basis for the long-standing belief that a widely used non-prescription drug in China and certain other countries can prevent and treat cataracts, a clouding of the lens of the eye that ...
Biochemistry
Jan 12, 2011
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A cataract is a clouding that develops in the crystalline lens of the eye or in its envelope, varying in degree from slight to complete opacity and obstructing the passage of light. Early in the development of age-related cataract, the power of the lens may be increased, causing near-sightedness (myopia), and the gradual yellowing and opacification of the lens may reduce the perception of blue colours. Cataracts typically progress slowly to cause vision loss, and are potentially blinding if untreated. The condition usually affects both eyes, but almost always one eye is affected earlier than the other.
A senile cataract, occurring in the elderly, is characterized by an initial opacity in the lens, subsequent swelling of the lens and final shrinkage with complete loss of transparency. Moreover, with time the cataract cortex liquefies to form a milky white fluid in a Morgagnian cataract, which can cause severe inflammation if the lens capsule ruptures and leaks. Untreated, the cataract can cause phacomorphic glaucoma. Very advanced cataracts with weak zonules are liable to dislocation anteriorly or posteriorly. Such spontaneous posterior dislocations (akin to the historical surgical procedure of couching) in ancient times were regarded as a blessing from the heavens, because some perception of light was restored in the cataractous patients.
Some children develop cataracts, called congenital cataracts, before or just after birth, but these are usually dealt with in a different way to cataracts in adults.
Cataract derives from the Latin cataracta meaning "waterfall" and that from the Greek καταράκτης (kataraktēs) or καταρράκτης (katarrhaktēs), "down-rushing", from καταράσσω (katarassō) meaning "to dash down" (from kata-, "down"; arassein, "to strike, dash"). As rapidly running water turns white, the term may later have been used metaphorically to describe the similar appearance of mature ocular opacities. In Latin, cataracta had the alternate meaning "portcullis" and it is possible that the name passed through French to form the English meaning "eye disease" (early 15c.), on the notion of "obstruction". Early Persian physicians called the term nazul-i-ah, or "descent of the water"—vulgarised into waterfall disease or cataract—believing such blindness to be caused by an outpouring of corrupt humour into the eye.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
