Modeling of a Circular Magnetic-Fluid Deformable Mirror for Ophthalmic Applications

Adaptive optics (AO) systems make use of active optical elements namely wavefront correctors to improve the quality of imaging through dynamically varying media. Vision science is an area of application of these systems where they have been used to enhance the resolution of imaging of internal parts of the human eye. However, their widespread use in clinical devices is limited due to the insufficient performance and high costs of the currently available wavefront correctors. Recently, magnetic fluid deformable mirrors (MFDM) have been proposed as a type of wavefront correctors that can sufficiently overcome the problems associated with the existing wavefront correctors. The practical implementation of this new type of deformable mirrors is contingent on the development of effective methods to model and control the shape of their deformable surface. To help meet this critical requirement, this paper presents an analytical model of a circular MFDM in cylindrical geometry. The resulting model can be used in the design of control systems for ophthalmic adaptive optics systems. Preliminary results of an experimental investigation aimed at validation of the analytical model are also presented.