In vivo noninvasive measurement of spatially resolved corneal elasticity in human eyes using Lamb wave optical coherence elastography
Zi Jin, Sisi Chen, Yingying Dai, Chenhong Bao, Shuling Ye, Yuheng Zhou, Yiyi Wang, Shenghai Huang, Yuanyuan Wang, Meixiao Shen, Dexi Zhu, Fan Lü
Abstract
Current elastography techniques are limited in application to accurately assess spatially resolved corneal elasticity in vivo for human eyes. The air-puff optical coherence elastography (OCE) with an eye motion artifacts correction algorithm is developed to distinguish the in vivo cornea vibration from the eye motion and visualize the Lamb wave propagation clearly in healthy subjects. Based on the Lamb wave model, the phase velocity dispersion curve in the high-frequency is calculated to obtain spatially resolved corneal elasticity accurately with high repeatability. It is found that the corneal elasticity has regional variations and is correlated with intraocular pressure, which suggests that the method has the potential to provide noninvasive measurement of spatially resolved corneal elasticity in clinical practice.