1. A system for characterizing biomechanical properties of tissue within an eye, comprising: a perturbation component that introduces a stress to the eye tissue; an imaging component operative to obtain images of the eye tissue such that a first image of the tissue can be obtained prior to the introduction of the stress and a second image of the tissue can be obtained after the introduction of the stress; and an image analysis component that compares the first image set and the second image set as to determine at least one biomechanical property of the tissue.