Science Corporation Implants Vision-Restoring PRIMA BCI Chip in First Stargardt Disease Patient

Inside Science Corporation's Clinical Breakthrough at TechCrunch Disrupt

**Science Corporation** CEO **Max Hodak** announced onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt that the company has successfully implanted its vision-restoring bioelectronic chip, **PRIMA**, into its first patient diagnosed with **Stargardt disease**—an inherited juvenile macular degeneration that progressively destroys central vision.

Hodak, previously the co-founder and president of Neuralink, explained how PRIMA fits into Science Corporation's long-term roadmap for clinical brain-computer interfaces (BCIs).

"The retina is part of the central nervous system," Hodak said. "We consider cochlear implants, retinal prostheses, motor prostheses—these are all different types of BCIs." Rather than viewing neural interfaces solely as a mechanism to move computer cursors, Science Corp is targeting high-impact therapeutic restoration across sensory pathways.

How the PRIMA Retinal Implant Bypasses Damaged Photoreceptors

Stargardt disease attacks the outer retina, gradually killing the eye's light-sensing photoreceptor cells while leaving the inner retina—the neural layer responsible for relaying visual signals to the optic nerve and visual cortex—largely intact. Approximately **150,000 patients globally** suffer from vision loss caused by the condition, which currently has no pharmacological cure.

The PRIMA system pairs a miniature wireless subretinal photovoltaic microchip with specialized camera-equipped glasses: • **Real-Time Visual Encoding:** A micro-camera mounted on the patient's glasses captures the visual scene and processes it using edge computer-vision algorithms. • **Near-Infrared Projection:** The glasses project the processed pattern onto the subretinal PRIMA chip using invisible near-infrared light. • **Direct Bipolar Cell Stimulation:** Photovoltaic pixels on the implant convert that light directly into pulsed electrical micro-currents, stimulating the surviving inner-retina neurons to transmit form vision to the brain.

From European Commercial Rollout to Multi-Indication Neurotech Scale

While PRIMA is already commercially available in Europe for patients who have lost central sight due to geographic atrophy (an advanced stage of age-related macular degeneration), demonstrating efficacy in Stargardt disease significantly broadens the addressable patient population.

Combined with AI-driven signal processing that continuously sharpens contrast, edge detection, and letter magnification on the wearable processor, retinal BCIs are proving that neural hardware can achieve regulatory approval and real-world clinical revenue today.