DIFFERENTIATION OF FLUOROPHORES AT THE FUNDUS BY MEANS OF IMAGING - SPECTROMETRY AND TIME -RESOLVED LASER SCANNER TECHNIQUE

97th DOG Annual Meeting 1999

P491
DIFFERENTIATION OF FLUOROPHORES AT THE FUNDUS BY MEANS OF IMAGING - SPECTROMETRY AND TIME -RESOLVED LASER SCANNER TECHNIQUE

D. Schweitzer, A. Kolb, M. Hammer, E. Thamm, J. Strobel

For the functional diagnosis of the layered fundus, the autofluorescence is expected to deliver new results, especially in the investigation of the pathomechanism in AMD. As also in young healthy persons an autofluores-cence is detectable, a discrimination between different fluorophores is necessary. A 2-dimensional demonstration of the local distribution of different fluorophores would be required. The detection of the fundus autofluorescence is known by means of Laser Scanning Technique. It will be demonstrated that the 2-dimensional autofluorescence can be detected with a fundus cam-era FF450 (Carl Zeiss Jena) choosing an optimal filter combination. Further it will be shown the simultaneous measurement of spectrally separated auto-fluorescence spectra at neighbouring locations. The discrimination of fluoro-phores at the identical site can be performed according to the fluorescence decay time measurement after pulse excitation. This principle is new in the ophthalmologic technique. The scheme of a Laser Scanner Ophthalmoscope for the discrimination of fluorophores by means of measuring the decay time (tau-mapping) will be given. The range of the measurable decay time is 1 ns to 10 ns.

Department of Ophthalmology, University of Jena, Bachstr. 18 07740 Jena, Germany

Supported by German Ministry BMBF No: 13N7096/6

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