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Optical coherence tomography – basic optical principles
Author(s) -
Irsch Kristina
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
acta ophthalmologica
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.534
H-Index - 87
eISSN - 1755-3768
pISSN - 1755-375X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1755-3768.2019.5014
Subject(s) - optical coherence tomography , optics , interferometry , interference (communication) , physics , wavelength , coherence (philosophical gambling strategy) , light beam , position (finance) , broadband , computer science , telecommunications , channel (broadcasting) , finance , quantum mechanics , economics
Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) is an optical analogue to ultrasound imaging. The much higher speed of light compared with sound allows for finer cross‐sectional views of the retina and anterior segment. Since it is extremely difficult to directly detect the shorter “echo” times it takes light to travel from different structures at axial distances within the eye, interferometry is used. Incident light is thus split into two beams, and the beam backscattered from the ocular tissue is then compared (“interfered”) with the beam that has traveled a known time from the reference mirror. Broadband (i.e., low “coherence”) light sources are used, because they produce a wider band of wavelengths, and thereby enable greater sensitivity in comparing the travel time differences of the two beams. In time‐domain OCT, the reference mirror position is altered, so that interference patterns are generated whenever the two beams have traveled almost the same amount of time. In spectral‐domain OCT, the reference mirror position is fixed and the mixed interference patterns are separated via spectral wavelength analysis. This lecture will explain underlying concepts of OCT with a discussion of cutting‐edge technological developments.