Patent ID: 7350920

Claim:
An ophthalmic instrument for capturing an image of the human eye comprising: an optical subsystem that directs light produced from a first light source into the human eye and that collects and collimates reflections of said light emitted from the human eye; wherein said light comprises phase-aligned wavefronts; and wherein said reflections comprise distorted wavefronts derived from said phase-aligned wavefronts; an adaptive optical subsystem, operably coupled to said optical subsystem, including a phase-compensating optical element, a controller, and a wavefront sensor; wherein the distorted wavefronts derived from said light produced from said first light source are recreated at said phase-compensating optical element and said wavefront sensor; wherein said wavefront sensor measures phase aberrations in said distorted wavefronts and operates in a closed-loop fashion with said controller so as to control said phase-compensating optical element to compensate for such phase aberrations to restore said distorted wavefronts to phase-aligned wavefronts; and an imaging subsystem, operably coupled to said adaptive optical subsystem, that captures an image of the phase-aligned wavefronts produced by said phase-compensating optical element; wherein said wavefront sensor includes a lenslet array and an imaging device; wherein said lenslet array spatially samples said distorted wavefronts and focuses samples of the distorted wavefront to form a test spot pattern; wherein said imaging device captures said test spot pattern; wherein phase aberrations in said distorted wavefronts are measured by characterizing movement of spots in said test spot pattern; wherein said wavefront sensor includes a relay lens operably coupled between said lenslet array and said imaging device; and wherein said relay lens and imaging device are mounted on a moveable stage that translates linearly along the optical axis of said relay lens and said imaging device.