Ocular aberrations as a function of wavelength in the near infrared measured with a femtosecond laser

A compact mode-locked Ti:sapphire laser, emitting a broad spectrum of 277 nm bandwidth, centered at 790 nm, was used to measure the dependence of the aberrations of the human eye with wavelength in the near infrared region. The aberrations were systematically measured with a Hartmann-Shack wave-front sensor at the following wavelengths: 700, 730, 750, 780, 800, 850, 870 and 900 nm, in four normal subjects. During the measurements, the wavelengths were selected by using 10 nm band-pass filters. We found that monochromatic high order aberrations, beyond defocus, were nearly constant across 700 to 900 nm wavelength in the four subjects. The average chromatic difference in defocus was 0.4 diopters in the considered wavelength band. The predictions of a simple water-eye model were compared with the experimental results in the near infrared. These results have potential applications in those situations where defocus or higher order aberration correction in the near infrared is required. This is the case of many imaging techniques: scanning laser ophthalmoscope, flood illumination fundus camera, or optical coherence tomography. (C) 2005 Optical Society of America.