title: Femtosecond optical ranging of corneal incision depth.
abstract: Excimer laser ablation has been proposed as a technique for keratorefractive surgery. Clinical acceptance of linear-incision laser keratectomy may depend on the availability of a method for accurately and noninvasively monitoring incision depth during the ablation process. We have developed a femto-second optical ranging technique for measurement of corneal incision depth. This technique uses nonlinear optical cross-correlation to determine the time-of-flight of an ultrashort laser pulse between the anterior corneal surface and the bottom of the keratectomy incision. Longitudinal and transverse resolution are estimated to be 5 micron and 10 micron, respectively.
authors.affiliation: Department of Ophthalmology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Stern
authors.forename: W Z
authors.initials: WZ
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.forename: C A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Puliafito
authors.forename: J G
authors.initials: JG
authors.lastname: Fujimoto
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002417:Cattle; D003315:Cornea / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D053685:Laser Therapy; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D055095:Optics and Photonics / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D013997:Time Factors