Purpose:
To design a tunable optomechanical fluid-filled eye model replicating the features and optical components of a life-sized eye for use by ophthalmologists as a testing apparatus
Methods:
We began by examining the Liou & Brennan 1997 model and optimizing our design using water as the aqueous solution and fused silica for the cornea and lens. We machined Delrin with an outer diameter of 28 mm, followed by drilling holes and inserts for placement of the optical components that would act as the cornea, irises (2mm to 5mm aperture), lens, a curved fiber-faceplate for the retina (10mm in height).
Results:
We used Zemax to simulate the optical system’s RMS spot size to be approximately 6um on a fiber faceplate with a resolution of 40um. The optical system is tunable to simulate defects in a human eye (i.e. myopia, hyperopia) by adjusting the distances of the components. The light is diverging from the fiber-faceplate and the CMOS sensor is not perfectly coupled to its surface causes a loss in resolution. However this can be remedied by removing the sensor and using a 4F optical relay system from the fiber faceplate onto a CMOS sensor.
Conclusions:
While a human eye contains more intricate fluids with varying refractive indices, our eye model presents a comparable system to an actual eye. It has the advantage to be customized to variety of different eye models by changing cornea and intraocular lens without the need to modify the optomechanical design. Initial testing using a mounted CMOS imager proved the eye has somewhere between 20/25 and 20/20 vision (Figure 1).
Keywords: imaging/image analysis: non-clinical • anatomy • intraocular lens