The long term objective of this project is to provide an instrumentation for diagnosing and quantification of the retinal changes associated with age-related macular degeneration (ARM) and age related maculopathy (AMD). The approach employed here is to integrate a multiply scattered light imaging mechanism into a confocal imaging system to obtain qualitative and quantitative diagnosis of subretinal structures and their changes. The system to be developed will be based on a Topographic Scanning System TopSSTM (Laser Diagnostic Technologies, Inc.). Vertical Cavity Surface Emitting Laser Arrays (VCSELs) will be implemented to provide an illumination source for both confocal imaging mode and multiply scattered light imaging mode. Phase I work of this project will start with hardware modifications of the existing TopSSTM system to implement the multiply scattered light imaging mode; clinical studies will then be carried out to test the feasibility of diagnosing subretinal changes associated with ARM and AMD using the modified TopSSTM system; software for measurement of the 3-dimensional subretinal structure and quantification of their changes will also be developed.
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