Mid-Level Vision Systems for Low Vision

描述（由申请人提供）：低视力是视力功能显著下降，不能通过普通镜片、药物治疗或手术完全矫正。衰老、受伤和疾病都会导致视力低下。其主要原因和致盲原因包括白内障和年龄相关性黄斑变性（AMD），这两种疾病在老年人中更为普遍。我们的首要目标是开发帮助视力低下的人的设备。我们建议使用计算机视觉和计算神经科学技术来构建增强自然图像的系统。我们计划在正常人和视力受损的老年人身上测试这些系统，有和没有AMD。我们有三个里程碑要达到：1)我们的第一个里程碑将是开发一个低噪声图像对比度增强系统，这应该有助于AMD，因为它会导致对比度灵敏度降低。2)我们的第二个里程碑将是一个以类似大脑皮层的方式提取图像主要轮廓的系统。在图像上叠加这些轮廓应该有助于解决遮挡边界的对比灵敏度问题。轮廓内的扩散区域应该有助于解决AMD中突出的拥挤问题。3)我们的第三个里程碑是探索这些系统是否可以帮助低视力人群。为此，我们计划使用为AMD量身定制的一系列搜索和识别心理物理测试。我们组建了一个跨学科的团队。首席研究员是南加州大学生物医学工程系的Norberto Grzywacz博士。Drs。南加州大学计算机科学系的Gerard Medioni和生物医学工程系的Bartlett Mel将分别领导具体目标1和2的工作。Drs。来自南加州大学心理学的Bosco Tjan，来自休斯顿大学的Susana Chung和来自哈佛医学院的Eli Peli将领导Specific Aim 3。其他科学家来自南加州大学。他们包括来自心理学的物体识别专家Irving Biederman博士和来自眼科的AMD专家Mark Humayun博士。他们还包括来自眼科的lone Fine医生和运动感知和知觉学习方面的专家Zhong-Lin Lu医生。前者是治疗长期失明后恢复视力的专家，后者是治疗长期失明后恢复视力的专家。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Low vision is a significant reduction of visual function that cannot be fully corrected by ordinary lenses, medical treatment, or surgery. Aging, injuries, and diseases can cause low vision. Its leading causes and those of blindness, include cataracts and age-related macular degeneration (AMD), both of which are more prevalent in the elderly population. Our overarching goal is to develop devices to aid people with low vision. We propose to use techniques of computer vision and computational neuroscience to build systems that enhance natural images. We plan test these systems on normal people and visually impaired older adults, with and without AMD. We have three milestones to reach: 1) Our first milestone will be to develop a system for low-noise image-contrast enhancement, which should help with AMD, because it causes lower contrast sensitivity. 2) Our second milestone will be a system that extracts the main contours of images in a cortical-like manner. Superimposing these contours on images should help with contrast-sensitivity problems at occlusion boundaries. Diffusing regions inside contours should help with crowding problems prominent in AMD. 3) Our third milestone is to probe whether these systems can help people with low vision people. For this purpose, we plan to use a battery of search and recognition psychophysical tests tailor-made for AMD. We put together an interdisciplinary team. The Principal Investigator is Dr. Norberto Grzywacz from Biomedical Engineering at USC. Drs. Gerard Medioni from Computer Science and Bartlett Mel from Biomedical Engineering at USC will lead the efforts in Specific Aims 1 and 2 respectively. Drs. Bosco Tjan from USC Psychology, Susana Chung from the University of Houston, and Eli Peli from Harvard Medical School will lead Specific Aim 3. Other scientists are from USC. They include Dr. Irving Biederman from Psychology, an object-recognition expert and Dr. Mark Humayun, from Ophthalmology, an AMD expert. They also include Dr. lone Fine, from Ophthalmology, an expert in people who recover vision after a prolonged period without it and Dr. Zhong-Lin Lu, an expert on motion perception and perceptual learning.