Is there any deeper study on long term effects regarding retinal damage?

I would imagine, even with safe dosages, there would be some form of cumulative effect in terms of retinal phototoxicity.

More so if we consider the scenario that this becomes a standard COTS feature in cars and we are walking around a city centre with a fleet of hundreds of thousands of these laser sources.

▲

eurekin 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Some lidar units simply use the wavelength that the human eye is opaque to.

The grandparent comment is about camera lenses with little to no near infrared cutoff filter. Some older iPhones were like that and that was the original breaking story.

▲

IsTom 2 hours ago | parent [-]

> human eye is opaque to

Absorbing the laser isn't necessarily any good. Very hypothetically it could lead to cataracts.

▲

eurekin 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Sun emits much stronger IR, near-IR, UV

	▲	bregma an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		Absolutely, and is a major cause of cataracts. Somewhat near 100% of people with lenses in their eyes will get cataracts eventually if they are ever exposed to unfiltered sunlight.
	▲	IsTom 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		And staring directly at the sun is not recommended.

▲

Terr_ 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I suspect we can't quantify human eye-damage enough to easily rule-out chronic effects... until it's too late for the patient.