Abstract
Contact lenses are typically measured by the wet-box method because of the high optical power resulting from the anterior central curvature of cornea, even though the back vertex power of the lenses are small. In this study, an optical measurement system based on the Shack-Hartmann wavefront principle was established to investigate the aberrations of soft contact lenses. Fitting conditions were micmicked to study the optical design of an eye model with various topographical shapes in the anterior cornea. Initially, the contact lenses were measured by the wet-box method, and then by fitting the various topographical shapes of cornea to the eye model. In addition, an optics simulation program was employed to determine the sources of errors and assess the accuracy of the system. Finally, samples of soft contact lenses with various Diopters were measured; and, both simulations and experimental results were compared for resolving the controversies of fitting contact lenses to an eye model for optical measurements. More importantly, the results show that the proposed system can be employed for study of primary aberrations in contact lenses.