Optical analysis of human eye using electromagnetic wave theory

Abstract

We present a two-dimensional electromagnetic analysis of light propagation through the human eye to examine the eye's optical properties. The electromagnetic approach has intriguing advantages over the conventional and frequently implemented ray optics analysis. The chromatic, spherical, and coma aberrations and the intensity of the focused light at the retina are computed in this work via full-wave analysis. We also investigate the effects of the cornea's and lens's curved structures on the focusing mechanism. The focal length and chromatic and spherical aberrations are observed to change owing to age-related refractive index variation in the lens. In addition, the effects of the lens and curvatures of the human eye on focusing are analyzed. Consequently, for both young and old human eye lenses, the differences due to the aberration variations, curvature surfaces, and gradient index are explored by the wave approach. The intensity distributions on the retina for both on-and off-axis illumination are calculated. A strong correlation between the locations of the nerve fibers and the intensity distribution is confirmed. On the basis of the findings, we can conclude that visual impairment due to deterioration of the human eye structure is more dramatic than that due to aging. (C) 2013 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)