Birefringence and nerve fiber orientation in healthy in vivo primate RNFL with enhanced polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography (EPS-OCT)

摘要

Form-birefringent properties of the retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) have become increasingly important as investigators strive to provide an improved methodology for glaucoma diagnosis. Techniques such as scanning laser polarimetry (SLP) and polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography (PS-OCT) are two approaches which directly assess RNFL neurotubules, the sub-cellular structures responsible for form-birefringence and axoplasmic transport in retinal ganglion cell axons. We present a novel algorithm for enhancing the sensitivity of PS-OCT. Enhanced polarization-sensitive OCT (EPS-OCT) is capable of detecting small transformations in polarization typically experienced by light propagating through the thin and weakly birefringent primate RNFL. We report birefringence and nerve fiber orientation measurements for the peripapillary region in healthy in vivo primate RNFL and discuss the implications of the enhanced-sensitivity approach on noninvasive quantification of form-birefringence in glaucoma diagnostics.