Monte Carlo simulation of Near-Infrared light-interaction in Diabetic Macular Edema.

Abstract

Diabetic Macular Edema (DME) is considered as a major threat to patients that are diagnosed with diabetes. The effects of this disease may lead to severe and even permanent vision lossif timely treatment is not obtained. This research presented a Monte Carlo simulation - a stochastic type of simulation that is widely used to describe different physical phenomena – of two mathematical models: The normal eye model and the eye that is affectedDiabetic Macular Edema. Each model was divided into a number of layers and each layer is described according to its optical properties. The Monte Carlo simulation software traced the path of individual photons of Near-Infrared light and recorded their interactions with the layers. This research aims to compare the output of the models to explore and understand the effect of DME on the eye. The important findings of this project is the effect of the disease on the thickness due to the swelling caused by the leak of the fluid from the Blood-Retinal Barrier (BRB) and scattering event which decreased due to the absorption of light by the leaked fluid that are considered the main of the absorbers of the Near-Infrared (NIR) light and the increase of the thickness of the cell bodies that reduce the backscattering light. We aim to extend the project to simulate the whole retina instead of the three layers that were used and we recommend to continue exploring the other retinal layers effected by DME and also building models for other eye diseases to enrich the information of such cases.