Eye glasses that change with you

Science News reports on newly developed eye glasses that can change their focus electronically depending on what the wearer needs. Here's how the article describes the workings of these new glasses:

[T]he researchers created sandwiches of glass sheets separated by a fluid layer 5 micrometers thick. The filling consists of a transparent substance, a type of liquid crystal, that's made up of rod-shaped molecules suspended in a liquid. The team used precise computer-chip–manufacturing methods to apply a bull's-eye pattern of transparent electrodes to the inner surface of one of the glass sheets.

In response to voltages applied to those electrodes, the liquid-crystal rods rotate into new orientations, explains Guoqiang Li of the University of Arizona and a member of the development team. The rod orientation determines the speed at which light passes through the liquid-crystal layer. Light rays bend as they traverse the layer and so can become focused, much as they would when passing through an ordinary lens.

While the glasses look clunkly now, you can be sure that with futher development and work, the glasses will look better, perform better, and be useful.