The Institute for Surgical Technology and Biomechanics (ISTB) conducts basic and applied research for the prevention and treatment of disease, working from the cell level to organ systems. The focus is on developing solutions that address particular clinical problems or unmet clinical needs. Currently, the institute focuses on surgical technologies and biomechanics.

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     The cornea provides over 60% to the refractive power of the human eye. An ideal refractive shape is an axis-symmetric surface with an elliptical profile, but a wide range of ophthalmic surgical procedures alters corneal shape to induce local or global curvature changes. The current surgical approach to define incision parameters rely on statistical information and is unable to accurately predict patient-specific surgical outcome. In this project, we develop biomechanical model of the cornea to enable the optimization of the surgical procedure for each individual patient. Initial results showed a good agreement between the numerical prediction and clinical outcome, which indicates that the simulations are able to closely predict the specific biomechancial response of each cornea.