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| Eyeglass Lenses and Visual Aids from Industrial Production |
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During his visit to Carl Zeiss in Jena, Gullstrand proposed that a magnifier should be constructed with a large field of view which he required for the exact evaluation of photographs. Moritz von Rohr solved this problem with what is known as the ”Verant magnifier”. He also accepted the fundamental importance of ”Gullstrand’s requirements” for the development of optical instruments.
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| Moritz von Rohr (1868–1940) | The Verant magnifier developed by
Moritz von Rohr on the basis of Gullstrand’s idea. | Telescopic eyeglasses,
ca. 1910 | K 4 vario telescopic eyeglasses |
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As early as 1903, he expanded on Abbe’s theory of ray limitation. In 1908 the Zeiss management entrusted Moritz von Rohr with the task of investigating the possibilities of improving eyeglass lenses. He had no difficulty overcoming this challenge and soon presented the result of his work. ”For vision with the moving eye, the correction of oblique bundles must be performed for the center of rotation of the eye” applied just as much to eyeglass lenses as it did to the Verant magnifier.
With the assistance of H. Boegehold and A. Sonnefeld, the computations required for spherical, point-focal eyeglass lenses were completed in 1912. Punktal® lenses from Carl Zeiss soon conquered the world. In collaboration with Gullstrand, visual aids were created to correct astigmatism, and astigmatic Punktal® lenses and Katral® lenses were produced for aphakic eyes, i.e. eyes without a crystalline lens.
| | With the development of telescopic eyeglasses for people with severe visual handicaps and of eyeglasses for anisometropic wearers (i.e. persons with unequal refractive power in their two eyes), Carl Zeiss was able to offer a complete line of high quality visual aids. When the ”Optical and Medical Instrument Department” was officially founded on April 1, 1912, the company already boasted the most advanced facilities for eyeglass lens production and an extensive range of optical instruments for use in medicine. |
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