Artificial intelligence 'as good as eye experts'

Artificial intelligence can diagnose eye disease as accurately as some leading experts, research suggests. A study by Moorfields Eye Hospital in London and the Google company DeepMind found that a machine could learn to read complex eye scans and detect more than 50 eye conditions. Doctors hope artificial intelligence could soon play a major role in helping to identify patients who need urgent treatment. They hope it will also reduce delays. A team at DeepMind, based in London, created an algorithm, or mathematical set of rules, to enable a computer to analyse optical coherence tomography (OCT), a high resolution 3D scan of the back of the eye.