Figure 3.

(a) A typical WAXS pattern from the central normal chick cornea. Uniformly thin, regularly spaced collagen fibrils arranged in all directions within the corneal plane produce a well-defined circular pattern. Lobes of increased intensity arising from x-ray signal perpendicular to the alignment of fibrils are indicated. (b) The intensity as a function of angle is measured. (c) Scatter from preferentially aligned fibrils is converted into polar vector plots. The radial extent of the resulting plot in a particular direction represents the relative number of collagen fibrils preferentially aligned in that direction. (d and e) Lamellae are preferentially aligned in an orthogonal and uniaxial orientation, respectively, and the polar vector plots that would represent each arrangement are shown.