One California biohacker has discovered an eyedrop which allows him to see in low light conditions thanks to a natural compound found in deep-sea fish called Chlorin e6.
Supplements and blue light filters may help ease digital eye strain, but for lasting vision health it’s crucial to consume plenty of leafy greens and fish in your diet.
Magnets in the ears
Many people use the term biohacking to refer to experiments and modifications they engage in to enhance their lives, from relatively tame to extreme practices. A Utah salesman named Rich Lee got sound transmitting magnets implanted in his ears so he could practice echolocation as an alternate survival skill should his vision deteriorate in future years. Though Lee took precautions by hiring a body modification artist for the procedure, medical standards still consider it potentially hazardous.
Biohacking may involve taking supplements or experimenting with food. Meanwhile, other cutting-edge methods like thermogenesis and inversion therapy may provide healthy weight loss, increased energy and reduced cellular ageing. Although such practices claim to promote weight loss while increasing energy and decreasing cell ageing, most biohacks lack rigorous testing and may pose risks.
Thermogenesis is a method that encourages the body to produce more heat by increasing metabolism and blood flow, used by biohackers as an effective way of losing excess weight and adapting more readily to cold weather. Another popular biohacking night vision technique involves injecting Chlorin e6 into one eye to temporarily alter molecules so they respond more strongly to light.
Some individuals prefer more advanced techniques such as neurofeedback and heart rate variability training to boost creativity and IQ by identifying patterns in how the brain reacts to stressors, or as training methods to break addictions or increase memory capacity.
Biohacking can be effective, but it is essential that results are monitored safely by professional doctors and monitored properly by patients themselves. Unfortunately, many “garage biologists” and grinders promote untested methods that border on illegal. Some biohacks even involve implanting humans with foreign objects not usually used in research labs – leading to unintended side effects or even death as part of these experiments.
Chlorin e6
An experiment that may seem unlikely but may have real-life applications was conducted recently by biochemical engineers working for Science for the Masses citizen science organization, where one of their volunteers temporarily gained night vision by using eye drops provided by Science for the Masses to enhance his eyesight to see objects 50 meters away in virtually complete darkness.
To achieve their objective, scientists employed Chlorin e6 (or Ce6) – a chlorophyll derivative found in deep sea fish that’s also used to treat night blindness – as part of a solution. By moistening his eyes with Ce6 eye drops, their volunteer was able to recognize shapes at 50 meters distances.
This work builds upon prior experiments demonstrating Ce6 as a photosensitizer for tumor therapy, known as photodynamic therapy or PDT. PDT involves administering laser light exposure to activate a photosensitizer that accumulates in tumor tissue before producing reactive oxygen species that kill tumor cells while simultaneously closing blood vessels around them.
PDT relies heavily on its photosensitizer providing sufficient concentrations of reactive oxygen at tumor sites without damaging healthy tissue, so this preclinical study carefully defined optimal exposure parameters and therapeutic windows for transscleral photodynamic therapy using chlorin e6 in rabbit eyes by correlating clinical, histological, and thermal responses in an animal model.