Electric discharge-induced cavitation: a competing approach to pulsed lasers for performing microsurgery in liquid media

Daniel V. Palanker; Igor Turovets; Aaron Lewis

doi:10.1117/12.275499

16 June 1997 Electric discharge-induced cavitation: a competing approach to pulsed lasers for performing microsurgery in liquid media

Daniel V. Palanker, Igor Turovets, Aaron Lewis

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 2975, Laser-Tissue Interaction VIII; (1997) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.275499
Event: BiOS '97, Part of Photonics West, 1997, San Jose, CA, United States

Abstract

Cavitation bubbles generated by fast overheating of water during pulsed laser applications in liquid medium have been shown to be a driving force of the soft tissue cutting. An alternative approach proposed in this paper is the generation of cavitation bubbles by fast overheating of liquid conductive medium by a short pulse of electric current. An electrical system based on a tapered microelectrode has been developed for generation of a high voltage sub-microsecond discharge in physiological medium. A highly localized ozone of power dissipation - about 20 micrometers in size - results in a low threshold energy of cavitation bubble generation - about 3 (mu) J. Efficiency of the pulse energy conversion to the bubble energy is about 12 percent, which is lower than the best results obtained with laser- based instrumentation. In spite of this, due to the low threshold energy, the cavitation bubbles that are required for effective cutting of soft tissue are generated at a lower energy than has been achieved with the laser-based instrumentation. The prospects and limitations of this newly developed technology are compared to the present applications of fiber-delivered pulsed lasers in microsurgery.

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Daniel V. Palanker, Igor Turovets, and Aaron Lewis "Electric discharge-induced cavitation: a competing approach to pulsed lasers for performing microsurgery in liquid media", Proc. SPIE 2975, Laser-Tissue Interaction VIII, (16 June 1997); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.275499

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