Retinal imaging using adaptive optics optical coherence tomography with fast and accurate real-time tracking

Area of Science:

• Ophthalmology
• Biomedical Engineering
• Optical Imaging

Background:

• High-resolution 3-D retinal imaging is hindered by eye motion, causing artifacts that necessitate complex post-processing.
• Existing methods struggle to correct for both ocular aberrations and dynamic eye movements simultaneously.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce and evaluate a novel adaptive optics optical coherence tomography (AOOCT) system integrated with an adaptive optics scanning laser ophthalmoscope (AOSLO).
• To achieve real-time active eye motion correction for high-fidelity retinal imaging.

Main Methods:

• Development of a combined AOOCT and AOSLO system with independent focus adjustment capabilities.
• Implementation of real-time active eye motion correction using AOSLO for tracking retinal motion and aberrations.
• Utilizing a high-quality reference frame for enhanced eye tracking accuracy and session revisitation.

Main Results:

• The integrated system successfully corrects for ocular aberrations and retinal motion in real-time.
• Independent focus adjustment in AOOCT allows targeted imaging of different retinal layers.
• High revisitation accuracy enables collection of multiple volumes from the same retinal area.

Conclusions:

• The presented AOOCT system with active eye motion correction significantly minimizes motion-related artifacts in 3-D retinal imaging.
• This technology facilitates spatially targeted imaging and robust volume averaging across multiple sessions.
• It reduces the need for extensive post-processing, improving efficiency and data quality in retinal imaging research.