Abstract
We present Optical Incoherence Tomography (OIT): a completely digital method to generate tomographic retinal cross-sections from en-face through-focus image stacks acquired by non-interferometric imaging systems, such as en-face adaptive optics (AO)-ophthalmoscopes. We demonstrate that OIT can be applied to different imaging modalities using back-scattered light, including systems without inherent optical sectioning and, for the first time, multiply-scattered light, revealing a distinctive cross-sectional view of the retina. The axial dimension of OIT cross-sections is given in terms of focus position rather than optical path, as in OCT. We explore this property to guide focus position in cases where the user is "blind" focusing, allowing precise plane selection for en-face imaging of retinal pigment epithelium, the vascular plexuses and translucent retinal neurons, such as photoreceptor inner segments and retinal ganglion cells, using respectively autofluorescence, motion contrast and split detection techniques.
Highlights
High-resolution in-vivo imaging of the human retina can be achieved using Adaptive Optics (AO) ophthalmoscopes, such as Flood-Illumination Ophthalmoscopes (FIO) [1] and Scanning Laser Ophthalmoscopes (SLO) [2], owing to the capacity of AO to measure and correct for static and dynamic monochromatic ocular aberrations in real-time [3,4]
We presented Optical Incoherence Tomography (OIT): a completely digital method to generate tomographic retinal cross-sections from en-face through-focus image stacks acquired with any high numerical aperture non-interferometric AO-ophthalmoscope
We demonstrated that OIT can be applied to retinal imaging modalities such as AO-FIO, AO-SLO, split-detection, offset aperture, and motion contrast without any hardware modification
Summary
High-resolution in-vivo imaging of the human retina can be achieved using Adaptive Optics (AO) ophthalmoscopes, such as Flood-Illumination Ophthalmoscopes (FIO) [1] and Scanning Laser Ophthalmoscopes (SLO) [2], owing to the capacity of AO to measure and correct for static and dynamic monochromatic ocular aberrations in real-time [3,4]. The acquisition of image stacks around the retinal layer of interest, i.e. for different focal planes, and the assessment of image quality after acquisition, to select the best image stack, are mandatory, time-consuming steps which are not always compatible with the clinical environment To avoid these drawbacks, a focus-guidance tool becomes essential, especially to reveal hypo-reflective or transparent structures such as cone photoreceptor inner segments (IS) [6], retinal ganglion cells (RGC) [7], perfusion in microvasculature [8,10] or those masked by neighboring structures of high reflectivity such as retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) lying beneath photoreceptors [9]
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