Biomechanical eye model and measurement setup for investigating accommodating intraocular lenses.

We present a biomechanical eye model to induce pseudophakic accommodative movement for evaluation of the focal shift of accommodative intraocular lenses. Therefore, an accommodative intraocular lens (IOL) was implanted into freshly enucleated porcine eyes. The eyes were glued into a mechanical apparatus to expand the ciliar body effectuating mechanical accommodation. An optical coherence tomographer was used to measure positional and geometrical changes of the IOL for different levels of expansion. The expansion unit allowed stretching of the globe of several millimeters. With the biomechanical eye model we were able to simulate the mechanical functionality of accommodation as well as to measure the lens vault and change in geometry. Accommodative vault could only be measured with an intact vitreous, indicating that the vitreous plays an important role for the functionality of accommodative IOLs.

Effect of decentration and tilt on the image quality of aspheric intraocular lens designs in a model eye.

PURPOSE: To determine the impact of decentration and tilt on the imaging quality of aspheric intraocular lens (IOL) designs in a schematic model eye. SETTING: Institute of Medical Physics, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Erlangen, Germany. METHOD: A model eye was used to calculate the impact of misalignment on the imaging quality of 6 IOL designs. The crystalline lens in the model eye was replaced with IOL designs with 22.0 diopters nominal refractive power, and the anterior chamber depth (ACD) was set to the estimated ACD value provided by the manufacturer. The retinal position was optimized for the best image quality. The IOLs were decentered up to +/-1.0 mm and tilted up to +/-5 degrees relative to the line of sight. At each position, the modulation transfer function was recorded with 3.0 mm and 4.5 mm pupil diameters. The results between the IOL designs and those of the phakic model eye were then compared. RESULTS: Aberration-correcting IOLs were very sensitive to decentration and tilt. However, the impact of misalignment depended on IOL design. Aberration-free IOLs showed less sensitivity within a wide range of displacement but provided better results than the spherical IOL. CONCLUSIONS: Overall, modern aspheric IOLs provided better imaging quality than conventional spherical IOL designs. Aberration-free IOLs were less sensitive to decentration and tilt than aberration-correcting IOLs but provided better image quality than spherical IOLs. Aberration-correcting IOLs have the potential to provide diffraction-limited imaging quality when perfectly aligned.