{"id":203282,"date":"2025-08-13T21:14:55","date_gmt":"2025-08-13T12:14:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/?post_type=research-achieve&p=203282"},"modified":"2026-04-13T00:33:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T15:33:11","slug":"professor-seunghyup-yoos-team-develops-worlds-first-oled-contact-lens-for-on-eye-electroretinography","status":"publish","type":"research-achieve","link":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/en\/research-achieve\/professor-seunghyup-yoos-team-develops-worlds-first-oled-contact-lens-for-on-eye-electroretinography\/","title":{"rendered":"Professor Seunghyup Yoo\u2019s Team Develops World\u2019s First OLED Contact Lens for On-Eye Electroretinography"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
<(from left to right) : Professor Seunghyup Yoo , Dr. Jee Hoon Sim and OLED contact lens sample (center) ><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Electroretinography (ERG) is an ophthalmic diagnostic method used to determine whether the retina is functioning normally. It is widely employed for diagnosing hereditary retinal diseases or assessing retinal function decline.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A team of Korean researchers has developed a next-generation wireless ophthalmic diagnostic technology that replaces the existing stationary, darkroom-based retinal testing method by incorporating an \u201cultrathin OLED\u201d into a contact lens. This breakthrough is expected to have applications in diverse fields such as myopia treatment, ocular biosignal analysis, augmented-reality (AR) visual information delivery, and light-based neurostimulation.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A research team led by Professor Seunghyup Yoo from the School of Electrical Engineering, in collaboration with Professor Se Joon Woo of Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, Professor Sei Kwang Hahn of POSTECH, the CEO of PHI Biomed Co., and the Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute under the National Research Council of Science & Technology, has developed the world\u2019s first wireless, contact lens-based wearable retinal diagnostic platform using organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs).<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"
<Figure 1. Schematic and photograph of the wireless OLED contact lens><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

This technology enables ERG simply by wearing the lens, eliminating the need for large specialized light sources and dramatically simplifying the conventional, complex ophthalmic diagnostic environment.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Traditionally, ERG requires the use of a stationary Ganzfeld device in a dark room, where patients must keep their eyes open and remain still during the test. This setup imposes spatial constraints and can lead to patient fatigue and compliances challenges.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

To overcome these limitations, the joint research team integrated an ultrathin flexible OLED \u2014approximately 12.5 \u03bcm thick, or 6\u20138 times thinner than a human hair\u2014 into a contact lens electrode for ERG. They also equipped it with a wireless power receiving antenna and a control chip, completing a system capable of independent operation.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

For power transmission, the team adopted a wireless power transfer method using a 433 MHz resonant frequency suitable for stable wireless communication. This was also demonstrated in the form of a wireless controller embedded in a sleep mask, which can be linked to a smartphone \u2014further enhancing practical usability.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"
Figure 2. Schematic of the electroretinography (ERG) testing system using a wireless OLED contact lens and an example of an actual test in progress><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

While most smart contact lens\u2013type light sources developed for ocular illumination have used inorganic LEDs, these rigid devices emit light almost from a single point, which can lead to excessive heat accumulation and thus usable light intensity. In contrast, OLEDs are areal light sources and were shown to induce retinal responses even under low luminance conditions. In this study, under a relatively low luminance* of 126 nits, the OLED contact lens successfully induced stable ERG signals,\u00a0\u00a0producing diagnostic results equivalent to those obtained with existing commercial light sources.\u00a0\u00a0*Luminance: A value indicating how brightly a surface or screen emits light; for reference, the luminance of a smartphone screen is about 300\u2013600 nits (can exceed 1000 nits at maximum).<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Animal tests confirmed that the surface temperature of a rabbit\u2019s eye wearing the OLED contact lens remained below 27\u00b0C, avoiding corneal heat damage, and that the light-emitting performance was maintained even in humid environments\u2014demonstrating its effectiveness and safety as an ERG diagnostic tool in real clinical settings.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Professor Seunghyup Yoo stated that \u201cintegrating the flexibility and diffusive light characteristics of ultrathin OLEDs into a contact lens is a world-first attempt,\u201d and that \u201cthis research can help expand smart contact lens technology into on-eye optical diagnostic and phototherapeutic platforms, contributing to the advancement of digital healthcare technology.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"
<(left) Wireless operation of the OLED contact lens (right) Close-up of the OLED contact lens sample><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

Jee Hoon Sim, Hyeonwook Chae, and Su-Bon Kim, PhD researchers at KAIST, played a key role as co-first authors alongside Dr. Sangbaie Shin of PHI Biomed Co.. Corresponding authors are Professor Seunghyup Yoo (School of Electrical Engineering, KAIST), Professor Sei Kwang Hahn (Department of Materials Science and Engineering, POSTECH), and Professor Se Joon Woo (Seoul National University Bundang Hospital). The results were published online in the internationally renowned journal ACS Nano on May 1st.<\/p>\n

– Paper title: Wireless Organic Light-Emitting Diode Contact Lenses for On-Eye Wearable Light Sources and Their Application to Personalized Health Monitoring<\/p>\n

– DOI: https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1021\/acsnano.4c18563 <\/a><\/p>\n

– Related video clip: http:\/\/bit.ly\/3UGg6R8<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

325<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":203281,"template":"","research_category":[354],"class_list":["post-203282","research-achieve","type-research-achieve","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","research_category-nanotechnology-materials-science-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-achieve\/203282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-achieve"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/research-achieve"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/203281"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"research_category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ee.presscat.kr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research_category?post=203282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}