Chemical injuries to the eye can be devastating, but for the first time, surgeons at the Harvard Medical School were able to restore some vision to an eye that had collapsed as a result of such an injury.

Alkali had been thrown into the patient’s face, blinding him. Phthisis bulbi, or "wasting" of the eye resulted. Though this condition usually causes a detachment of the retina, ultrasound in this case revealed that some attachment still remained. The surgeons performed keratoprosthesis surgery to replace the center of the damaged cornea with a plastic device.

A year after surgery, the patient had regained substantial vision in the treated eye where before he had been able only to distinguish light from dark.