The coupling of oxygen with other reactive species in corneal metabolism provides useful insight into the transport of oxygen in cornea-contact-lens system. Specifically, we find that in addition to oxygen depletion and acidosis in the cornea, lactate concentration increases while glucose and bicarbonate concentrations decrease from the endothelium toward the epithelium. Unlike other indices of corneal oxygenation, ODF is sensitive specifically to regions of cornea with local oxygen deficiency. Accordingly, ODF is a useful physiologic index to assess the extent and severity of hypoxia in the cornea.

The rate of oxygen consumption is an important parameter to assess the physiology of the human cornea. Metabolism of oxygen in the cornea is influenced by contact-lens-induced hypoxia, diseases such as diabetes, surgery, and drug treatment. Therefore, estimation of in vivo corneal oxygen-consumption rate is essential for gauging adequate oxygen supply to the cornea. Phosphorescence quenching of a dye coated on the posterior of a soft contact lens provides a powerful technique to measure tear-film oxygen tension (Harvitt and Bonanno, Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci 1996;37:1026-1036; Bonanno et al., Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci 2002;43:371-376). Unfortunately, previous work in establishing oxygen-consumption kinetics from transient postlens tear-film oxygen tensions relies on the simplistic assumption of a constant corneal-consumption rate. A more realistic model of corneal metabolism is needed to obtain reliable oxygen-consumption kinetics. Here, physiologically relevant nonlinear Monod kinetics is adopted for describing the local oxygen-consumption rate, thus avoiding aphysical negative oxygen tensions in the cornea. We incorporate Monod kinetics in an unsteady-state reactive-diffusion model for the cornea contact-lens system to determine tear-film oxygen tension as a function of time when changing from closed-eye to open-eye condition. The model was fit to available experimental data of in vivo human postlens tear-film oxygen tension to determine the corneal oxygen-consumption rate. Reliance on corneal oxygen diffusivity and solubility data obtained from rabbits is no longer requisite. Excellent agreement is obtained between the proposed model and experiment. We calculate the spatial-averaged in vivo human maximum corneal oxygen-consumption rate as Q(c)(max) = 1.05 x 10(-4) mL/(cm(3) s). The calculated Monod constant is K(m) = 2.2 mmHg.

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An electrochemical-polarographic method is described for measuring the diffusivity, D, and solubility, k, of oxygen in aqueous-saturated polymer films. While the apparatus and procedure are general for such films, it is here applied to determine D and k for oxygen in hypertransmissible soft contact lenses. Usually, only oxygen permeability, P, the product of D and k, is measured because P gauges the steady flux of oxygen through hydrogel membranes. However, we utilize the polarographic technique in the unsteady state and, hence, obtain D and k separately. Determination of each of these properties is critical for designing better lens materials that ensure sufficient oxygen supply to the cornea. We have measured oxygen diffusivities and solubilities for nine commercial soft contact lenses. Our data indicate that oxygen diffusivity is primarily responsible for the range of oxygen permeability observed for hypertransmissible soft contact lenses. For 2-hydroxyethyl methacrylate (HEMA)-based lenses, measured solubilities suggest that over 90% of the dissolved oxygen partitions to the polymer phase.