Nearsightedness
The human eye's ability to accommodate allows it to view focused images of both nearby and distant objects. The lens of the eye assumes a large curvature (short focal length) to bring nearby objects into focus and a flatter shape (long focal length) to bring a distant object into focus. Unfortunately, the eye's inability to a provide a wide variance in focal length leads to a variety of vision defects. Most often, the defect occurs at one end of the spectrum - either the inability to assume a short focal length and focus on nearby objects or the inability to assume a long focal length and thus focus on distant objects.
Nearsightedness or myopia is the inability of the eye to focus on distant objects. The nearsighted eye has no difficulty viewing nearby objects. But the ability to view distant objects requires that the light be refracted less. Nearsightedness will result if the light from distant objects is refracted more than is necessary. The problem is most common as a youth, and is usually the result of a bulging cornea or an elongated eyeball. If the cornea bulges more than its customary curvature, then it tends to refract light more than usual. This tends to cause the images of distant objects to form at locations in front of the retina. If the eyeball is elongated in the horizontal direction, then the retina is placed at a further distance from the cornea-lens system. Subsequently the images of distant objects form in front of the retina. On the retinal surface, where the light-detecting nerve cells are located, the image is not focused. These nerve cells thus detect a blurry image of distant objects.
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