Small-angle intraocular light scatter: a hypothesis concerning its source.

The crystalline lens makes a major contribution to intraocular light scatter, yet the responsible structural features have not been identified. A hypothesis is presented that implicates the fiber architecture of the ocular lens in small-angle scatter, this being the only part contributing to the associated reduction in vision. The main evidence supporting this hypothesis is a calculation of light scatter by a model lattice of fibers simulating the fiber lattice of the ocular lens. The results agree well with the angular dependence of measured intraocular scatter and, for reasonable parametric values, agree also with the measured magnitude.