Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada.
Systems Design Engineering Department, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada.
Sci Rep. 2024 Sep 29;14(1):22553. doi: 10.1038/s41598-024-73402-y.
Potentially blinding corneal diseases alter the morphology of the human cornea. At the early stages of disease development, these changes occur at the cellular level. The ability to visualize and quantify such changes can lead to early diagnostics of corneal pathologies, which is pivotal for the long-term preservation of vision. Here we present a Powell Lens-based Line-Field Optical Coherence Tomography system that combines high spatial resolution (2.4 μm × 2.2 μm × 1.7 μm (x × y × z)) in biological tissue, sufficient to resolve individual cells, high sensitivity (90.5 dB), sufficient to image the semi-transparent human cornea, and fast image acquisition rate (~ 2,400 fps), sufficient to suppress most involuntary eye motion artifacts and allow for contactless, in-vivo imaging of the cellular structure of the human cornea. Volumetric images acquired in-vivo from corneas of healthy subjects show epithelial, endothelial and keratocytes cells, as well as sub-basal and stromal nerves. The system's high axial resolution also allows for volumetric morphometry of the corneal endothelium, Descemet's membrane and the pre-Descemet's (Dua) layer.
潜在致盲性角膜疾病会改变人类角膜的形态。在疾病发展的早期阶段，这些变化发生在细胞水平。能够可视化和量化这些变化可以实现角膜病变的早期诊断，这对于长期保持视力至关重要。在这里，我们展示了一种基于 Powell 透镜的线场光学相干层析成像系统，该系统结合了高空间分辨率（2.4 μm×2.2 μm×1.7 μm（x×y×z）），足以分辨单个细胞，高灵敏度（90.5 dB），足以对半透明的人眼角膜成像，以及快速的图像采集速度（~2400 fps），足以抑制大多数非自愿的眼睛运动伪影，并允许对人眼角膜的细胞结构进行非接触式、体内成像。从健康受试者的眼角膜体内采集的体积图像显示上皮细胞、内皮细胞和成纤维细胞，以及基底下和基质神经。该系统的高轴向分辨率还允许对角膜内皮、Descemet 膜和前 Descemet 层（Dua 层）进行体积形态测量。
