Patent ID: 7784944

Claim:
A device for determining a movement of an eye, comprising: an illumination unit, which generates optical radiation during operation and emits it as an illumination ray bundle for illumination of at least one region on the cornea of the eye; a distance-determining unit, which senses, in a temporally resolved manner, the illumination ray bundle returned by the cornea as a detection ray bundle and generates a distance signal using the received optical radiation of the detection ray bundle, said signal corresponding to a distance of the cornea from a reference plane, which is defined relative to the distance-determining unit; and an evaluating unit which, using said distance signal, generates a position or movement signal corresponding to a position or movement of the eye; illumination optics for focusing the illumination ray bundle for at least one wavelength in a predetermined range of possible positions of the cornea; and wherein the distance-determining unit performs confocal imaging and comprises: detection optics, a small-aperture stop arranged following said detection optics and located in a stop plane, and a detection unit arranged following said aperture stop for detecting a part of the detection ray bundle having passed the small-aperture stop, wherein the stop plane is conjugated with an object plane associated with the wavelength, said object plane being located in a range of possible positions of the cornea.