In Vivo Characterization of Corneal Changes in a Type 1 Diabetic Animal Model

Abstract Diabetes mellitus (DM) is a metabolic disease that affects 9% of the adult population, promoting an increase in glucose concentration that affects the corneal structure, namely, its thickness, as well as the constituents and flow of the aqueous humor. In this study, high-frequency transducers (20-MHz and 50-MHz) were used to measure and characterize changes in the corneal and aqueous humor in streptozotocin-induced type 1 diabetic rats followed over 8 weeks. Increases of 24.6 and 15.4 μ m in central corneal thickness were measured with the 20-MHz and 50-MHz probes, respectively, in DM rats ( p p