Determination of the radius of curvature of the anterior lens surface from the Purkinje images.

A new method for calculating the radius of curvature of the anterior surface of the crystalline lens from the measured heights of the Purkinje image PI and PIII is given. Equations are developed for determination of the radius of curvature of the equivalent mirror for three configurations commonly used in phakometry. The method can be applied to targets at any distance from the corneal vertex, for both a stationary target mounted independently of the camera, and for a mobile source attached to the camera where the distance of the target to the corneal vertex will change as the camera is refocused from image PI to PIII. The situation where only one recording is made of images PI and PIII, where the camera is focused on image PI, and the height of the defocused image of PIII is measured is also considered. The errors in calculating the anterior lens radius with the equivalent mirror method if no allowance is made for an object at a finite distance is examined. The new method described is an alternative to collimating targets to overcome the errors in phakometry that occur with targets at finite distances.