Axial and peripheral eye length measured with optical low coherence reflectometry.

An optical low-coherence reflectometer (OLCR device) is described that allows the precise and noncontact measurement of eye length. The device measures eye length both on-axis and off-axis, thus enabling the determination of eye shape, an ocular parameter thought to be important in the development of refractive error. It is essential for several applications in ophthalmology and vision science. This improved OLCR device operates using a single-beam interferometer with a beam deflection mechanism that allows the precise measurement of eye length along the visual axis and within 15 deg horizontally and vertically from the fovea. The validity of this instrument and its revised software is evaluated by measuring the reproducibility of axial length results in an adult eye and an artificial eye, and by correlating axial eye length measured in a group of ten adult eyes with axial eye length obtained with A-scan ultrasound in the same eyes. The precision obtained with adult subjects is compared with that obtained with children.