Tinted lenses that correct for high order aberrations
View Patent ↗Disclosed herein are photopolymerizable compositions and formulations that comprise photochromic dyes, photochromic blue light blocking dyes, permanent dyes, permanent blue blocking dyes, and/or their combinations. In some variations, these formulations are suited for example, for sandwiching between lens blanks to form semi-finished lens assemblies to form a tinted lens useful in sunglasses. The formulations are also suitable for correcting optical aberrations, and may provide a photochromic effect when exposed to sunlight.
1. A method of tinting a wavefront aberrator that contains a sandwich configuration of two transparent plates having a cured polymer sandwiched in between said plates, said method comprising adding an effective amount of a dye to said curable polymer prior to said polymer being cured whereby the said wavefront aberrator is a sunglass lens.
2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the dye is a a permanent dye.
3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the cured polymer is a layer having a thickness of less than about 1 mm.
4. A method of making a sunglass wavefront aberrator which comprises: a. providing two transparent plates; b. depositing a layer of curable material between the two transparent plates wherein said curable material contains one or more monomers and an effective amount of a dye; and c. curing the curable material to form the sunglass wavefront aberrator.
5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the transparent plates are ophthalmic lenses.
6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the ophthalmic lenses comprise a base and a cap.
7. The method of claim 4 , wherein the curing step produces a polymer layer having a variable index of refraction.
8. The method of claim 4 , wherein the curing step produces a polymer layer having a constant index of refraction.
9. The method of claim 4 , wherein the dye is a a permanent dye.
10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the at least one permanent dye provides gray, brown, or green colors in the layer.
11. The method of claim 6 , wherein the cured polymer is a layer between said base and cap and said layer is less than about 0.5 mm thick.
12. In a method of making a wavefront aberrator by forming a layer of curable material between two transparent plates and curing said curable material, the improvement which comprises: adding an effective amount of a dye to said curable material prior to curing, wherein the wavefront aberrator comprises a sunglass wavefront aberrator when exposed to UV-light or sunlight.
13. The method of claim 12 , wherein the dye is photochromic dye.
14. The method of claim 13 , wherein the photochromic dye provides gray, brown, green, blue, yellow, orange, red, violet, or a combination of these colors in the layer.