Vascular morphology and blood flow signatures for differential artery-vein analysis in optical coherence tomography of the retina.

Differential artery-vein (AV) analysis is essential for retinal study, disease detection, and treatment assessment. This study is to characterize vascular reflectance profiles and blood flow patterns of retinal artery and vein systems in optical coherence tomography (OCT) and OCT angiography (OCTA), and establish them as robust signatures for objective AV classification. A custom designed OCT was employed for three-dimensional (3D) imaging of mouse retina, and corresponding OCTA was reconstructed. Radially resliced OCT B-scans revealed two, i.e. top and bottom, hyperreflective wall boundaries in retinal arteries, while these wall boundaries were absent in OCT of retinal veins. Additional OCTA analysis consistently displayed a layered speckle distribution in the vein, which may indicate the venous laminar flow. These OCT and OCTA differences offer unique signatures for objective AV classification in OCT and OCTA.