Intraocular Distance Measuring Interferometer

This research will lead to a new non-invasive technique for measuring intraocular distances. Thiswill provide such data as cornea thickness, ocular lens thickness, cornea-to-retina distance and, possibly,the thickness of the retina. These data may be provided as a function of direction relative to a fixedoptical axis. It will be one of our ultimate goals to map out a contour of the fundus with better than 50micron height resolution. The novelty of the proposed technique lies in the use of the wavelength tuningof a long coherence length laser diode to generate an interferogram which contains the encoded dataon the locations of the various reflective surfaces within the eye. By using this technique in conjunctionwith the use of the anterior cornea as a reference surface, no moving parts are needed and there is noneed to maintain interferometric stability between the source/detector module (i.e. the sensor itself) andthe eye. This, in turn, makes it feasible to use the instrument in a clinical setting -possibly even beinghand-held. All of the data processing can easily be done in a PC with a plug-in card, which would providepower to the sensor head.