Ultrafast laser pulses for medical applications

Abstract

Ultrafast lasers have become a promising tool for micromachining and extremely precise ablation of all kinds of materials. Due to the low energythreshold, thermal and mechanical side effects are limited to the sub 1m range. The neglection of side effects enables the use of ultrashort laser pulses in a broad field of medical applications. Moreover, the interaction process based on nonlinear absorption offers the opportunity to process transparent tissue three dimensionally inside the bulk. We demonstrate the feasibility of surgical procedures in different fields of medical interest: In ophthalmology intrastromal cutting and preparing of cornael flaps for refractive surgery in living animals is presented. Besides, the very low mechanical side effects enables the use of fs-laser in otoralyngology to treat ocecular bones. Moreover, the precise cutting quality can be used in fields of cardiovascular surgery for the treatment of arteriosklerosis as well as in dentistry to remove caries from dental hard tissue.

Role of Dissolved and Molecular Oxygen on Cu and PtCu Alloy Particle Structure during Laser Ablation Synthesis in Liquids

“…Pulsed laser ablation in liquids (PLAL) is aq uite recent approach for the production of ligand-free nanoparticles in liquid media and is ar esearch field that has attracted continuously growing interest. [11] To date, there are already many studies on laser-generated noble-metal nanoparticles, such as Pt, Au, or Pd, that deal with surfacec haracterization, [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14] particle-size control [15][16][17][18] and the synthesis of alloy nanoparticles, such as PtAu, AuAg, and PtIr. Influentialf actors that affect the particle properties are primarily laser characteristics (fluence, pulse duration,wavelength), the target material, and the ablation environment.…”

“…Lasers are ap owerful light source that can be used for av ariety of applications,w hich typically include welding, [1] cutting, [2,3] surveying, [4] barcode scanners, [5] and medical applications. [6] In research, the use of lasers is also indispensable because many analytical methodsa re based on light detection. Pulsed laser ablation in liquids (PLAL) is aq uite recent approach for the production of ligand-free nanoparticles in liquid media and is ar esearch field that has attracted continuously growing interest.…”

Pressure and Temperature Changes inIn VitroApplications with the Laser and Their Implications for Middle Ear Surgery

“…The laser parameters used had already been determined in preliminary experiments [19] to perform a complete perforation of the footplate.…”

Second-harmonic imaging of cornea after intrastromal femtosecond laser ablation

“…Previous studies utilized scanning-transmission electron microscopy or other standard methods of histological analysis. 23,24 The required fixation, embedding, and slicing procedures can produce considerable artifacts during the sample preparation process, and are tedious and time-consuming. Therefore, a noninvasive, high-resolution all-optical imaging method would be highly rewarding in characterizing corneal ultrastructure and evaluating fs laser intrastromal surgery effects.…”