Reproducing Glaucoma-like Elevated SRTs
by Desensitizing a Healthy Human Retina using Half-field and Localized Photobleaching
M. Sarkar (TU Delft - Aerospace Engineering)
D.M. Pool – Mentor (TU Delft - Control & Simulation)
Peter Bremen – Mentor (Erasmus MC)
Johan Pel – Mentor (Erasmus MC)
René M.M. van Paassen – Coach (TU Delft - Control & Simulation)
Yasemin Vardar – Coach (TU Delft - Human-Robot Interaction)
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Abstract
Glaucoma impacts vision by affecting visual processing at the retinal ganglion cell level. To recreate its impact on visual processing, photobleaching has been proposed to reversibly and temporarily induce glaucoma-like saccadic reaction time. It has been established that photobleaching elevates the threshold detection levels of visual stimuli in a healthy retina. This study investigated the potential implementation of photobleaching to recreate glaucoma-like SRTs. Results from the study show that photobleaching increased the SRT and reduced the ability to detect targets within the photobleaching zone of the visual field. The elevated SRTs obtained from the study indicate that photobleaching is a valid method for obtaining mild glaucoma-like SRTs. Furthermore, the effects of photobleaching were found to be highly localized, with the impact primarily observed within the bleaching zone. Attempts to replicate the localized effects of glaucoma using discrete photobleaching were inconclusive, with elevated SRTs observed in some cases, but the effect is directly related to the total area bleached. These findings provide the relationship between photobleaching, saccadic response, and their potential implications for artificially recreating glaucoma-like elevated SRTs