Quantitative Evaluation of Changes in Eyeball Shape in Emmetropization and Myopic Changes Based on Elliptic Fourier Descriptors

PURPOSE. To evaluate changes in eyeball shape in emmetropization and myopic changes using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and elliptic Fourier descriptors (EFDs). METHODS. The subjects were 105 patients (age range, 1 month-19 years) who underwent head MRI. The refractive error was determined in 30 patients, and eyeball shape was expressed numerically by principal components analysis of standardized EFDs. RESULTS. In the first principal component (PC1; the oblate-to-prolate change), the proportion of variance/total variance in the development of the eyeball shape was 76%. In all subjects, PC1 showed a significant correlation with age (Pearson r = -0.314; P = 0.001), axial length (AL, r = -0.378; P < 0.001), width (r = -0.200, P = 0.0401), oblateness (r = 0.657, P < 0.001), and spherical equivalent refraction (SER, r = 0.438; P = 0.0146; n = 30). In the group containing patients aged 1 month to 6 years (n = 49), PC1 showed a significant correlation with age (r = -0.366; P = 0.0093). In the group containing patients aged 7 to 19 years (n = 56), PC1 showed a significant correlation with SER (r = 0.640; P = 0.0063). CONCLUSIONS. The main deformation pattern in the development of the eyeball shape from oblate to prolate was clarified by quantitative analysis based on EFDs. The results showed clear differences between age groups with regard to changes in the shape of the eyeball, the correlation between these changes, and refractive status changes. (Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 2011;52:8585-8591) DOI: 10.1167/iovs.11-7221