[Research progress on imagine diagnosis of limbal stem cell deficiency]

Limbal stem cell deficiency (LSCD) is an ocular surface disease resulting from a reduction and/or dysfunction of limbal stem cells. The symptoms of LSCD are non-specific and can be difficult to distinguish from other ocular surface diseases through slit-lamp examination. Impression cytology is currently considered the gold standard for LSCD diagnosis; however,it is a qualitative method with low sensitivity. Nonetheless,emerging imaging techniques offer quantitative diagnosis and staging of LSCD. This review article examines four imaging methods and their associated parameters for diagnosing LSCD: optical coherence tomography,which measures corneal epithelial thickness; optical coherence tomography angiography,which detects corneal neovascularization; in vivo confocal microscopy,which measures corneal epithelial thickness,subbasal nerve density,and corneal basal cell density; and future applications of full-field/spectral-domain optical coherence tomography.