Application of 3-dimensional printing technology to construct an eye model for fundus viewing study.

Ping Xie,Xiaojun Zhang,Dongqing Yuan,Xinhua Li,Zizhong Hu,Qinghuai Liu,Zhishan Gao,Amit Singh

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0109373

Abstract

ObjectiveTo construct a life-sized eye model using the three-dimensional (3D) printing technology for fundus viewing study of the viewing system.MethodsWe devised our schematic model eye based on Navarro's eye and redesigned some parameters because of the change of the corneal material and the implantation of intraocular lenses (IOLs). Optical performance of our schematic model eye was compared with Navarro's schematic eye and other two reported physical model eyes using the ZEMAX optical design software. With computer aided design (CAD) software, we designed the 3D digital model of the main structure of the physical model eye, which was used for three-dimensional (3D) printing. Together with the main printed structure, polymethyl methacrylate(PMMA) aspherical cornea, variable iris, and IOLs were assembled to a physical eye model. Angle scale bars were glued from posterior to periphery of the retina. Then we fabricated other three physical models with different states of ammetropia. Optical parameters of these physical eye models were measured to verify the 3D printing accuracy.ResultsIn on-axis calculations, our schematic model eye possessed similar size of spot diagram compared with Navarro's and Bakaraju's model eye, much smaller than Arianpour's model eye. Moreover, the spherical aberration of our schematic eye was much less than other three model eyes. While in off- axis simulation, it possessed a bit higher coma and similar astigmatism, field curvature and distortion. The MTF curves showed that all the model eyes diminished in resolution with increasing field of view, and the diminished tendency of resolution of our physical eye model was similar to the Navarro's eye. The measured parameters of our eye models with different status of ametropia were in line with the theoretical value.ConclusionsThe schematic eye model we designed can well simulate the optical performance of the human eye, and the fabricated physical one can be used as a tool in fundus range viewing research.

Highlights

Since the Gullstrand’s model eye was proposed in the early 20th century [1], some new eye models have been devised by Navarro and Kooijman, which can better simulate the optical performance of the human eye [2,3,4]
Apart from these schematic eyes, other efforts had been made to fabricate concrete eye models that replicated both anatomical and optical properties of an average human eye. Those physical eye models were applied for visualization of intraocular lenses (IOLs) imaging properties [5], investigation of refractive errors [6], or assessment of the quality of soft contact lenses [7]
The purpose of this study is to provide a method to simplify the procedure of constructing a physical eye model that can correctly simulate the optical performance of human eye

Summary

Introduction

Since the Gullstrand’s model eye was proposed in the early 20th century [1], some new eye models have been devised by Navarro and Kooijman, which can better simulate the optical performance of the human eye [2,3,4]. Apart from these schematic eyes, other efforts had been made to fabricate concrete eye models that replicated both anatomical and optical properties of an average human eye. It seemed too complicate to construct such a concrete eye model for wide application

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion