Assisting people with Nystagmus through image stabilization: Using an ARX model to overcome processing delays

Pathological Nystagmus is characterized by an unintended and involuntary eye-movement, which tends to impact on visual acuity. Today only view therapies (for instance medication or surgeries) to treat nystagmus are at hand and the existing therapies only show partial improvement. Only general Assistive Technology (AT) solutions like glasses, screen magnifiers, speech output, display adaptation and concepts holders are at hand to support daily living. More specific ATs to reduce the impact of nystagmus are missing. This paper presents conceptual research and feasibility studies with the attempt to reduce the impact of nystagmus by stabilizing the image on the retina (digital Retinal Image Stabilization) by moving the digital image synchronal with the unintended eye movement using gaze contingent display technology. Further an identification and validation process using recorded eye-movements is presented since the synchronization approach relies on predicting eye-movements to reduce the impact of delays due to processing time.