There's a great article on The Engineer today covering an EPSRC funded project which is aiming to develop advanced machine-to-machine communication systems that capture and transmit images from highly efficient vision sensors mimicking the human retina.
The aim is that one day robots, surveillance cameras and drones will be able to detect changes to their environment far more quickly and efficiently, using a vision system based on the way the human eye and brain process information.
The article is available to read here.