NUMERICAL MODELING OF THE CORNEAS LAMELLAR STRUCTURE AND BIREFRINGENCE PROPERTIES

A model of the cornea's lamellar structure is proposed that is capable of explaining experimental results obtained for the transmission of n ormal-incidence polarized light through rabbit and bovine cornea. The model consists of a large number of planar lamellae, each approximated as a uniaxial birefringent layer, stacked one upon another with vario us angular orientations. Polarized light transmission through the comp osite system is modeled theoretically by use of the Jones matrix forma lism. The light transmission is calculated numerically for a large num ber of model lamellae arrangements, each generated from a statistical description, and histograms are constructed of various properties of t he light transmission, including the minimum and maximum cross-polariz ed output intensities. It is demonstrated that various structural and optical parameters of the lamellae arrangements of actual corneas may be estimated by comparison of the calculations with detailed experimen tal data. Certain characteristics of the histograms are identified tha t permit a clear distinction between random and partially ordered syst ems. Comparisons with previously published experimental data provide s trong evidence that the lamellae orientations are not entirely random, but rather a significant fraction are oriented in a fixed, preferred direction.