A view shows the completed electronic eye camera, mounted on printed circuit board (green) for connection to a computer for image acquisition in this undated handout image.

BEIJING, Aug. 7 (Xinhuanet) -- U.S. researchers have created the world's first "human eye" camera that could revolutionise photography, according to meida reports Thursday.

The prototype device is about the same size and shape as a real eye and has a curved "retina" that is sensitive to light.

Digital cameras work by focusing light onto a silicon chip containing light-sensitive pixels. But expanding the field of view leads to distortion around the edges. That's why vertebrate eyes are round -- to capture more of a scene without losing clarity.

The bowl-shaped electronic "retina" made of silicon could usher in a new generation of distortion-free digital and video cameras.

"This approach allows us to put electronics in places where we couldn't before," said John Rogers, an engineer at the University of Illinois, who led the research along with Yonggang Huang of Northwestern University.

Experiments already under way are testing other potential applications, including a thin, pliable monitor to detectelectrical signals travelling across the undulating surface of the human brain.