DESCRIPTION: In healthy normal subjects, the primary resolution limiting factors to retinal fundus imaging are the aberrations caused by the eyes' own optics. The applicant was among a team of investigators at the University of Rochester that first demonstrated that these aberrations could be measured with a Shack Hartman wavefront sensor and cancelled using a deformable mirror in a process called adaptive optics (AO). The applicant has now obtained funding from the NSF, University of Houston and Pharmacia and Upjohn to develop a similar device. This device would be incorporated into a scanning laser ophthalmoscope (SLO) rather than the more conventional fundus camera design used in Rochester. This SLO design has the potential to greatly decrease the effects of scattered light and further increase the resolution of fundus imaging.
NIH ExPorter
NIH ExPorter