Axicon: a new laser beam delivery system for corneal surgery

Author

Ren, Qiushi ; Birngruber, Reginald

Author_Institution

Wellman Labs. of Photomed., Massachusetts Gen. Hospital, Boston, MA, USA

Volume

26

Issue

12

fYear

1990

fDate

12/1/1990 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

2305

Lastpage

2308

Abstract

A new laser beam delivery system using axicon beam shaping has been designed to produce controllable surface ablation as well as trephination for the corneal surgery. Noncontact cornea trephination was performed on human eye-bank eyes by using a Q-switched Er:YAG laser with a axicon-lens combination. The results shows that the uniformity of the trephination along the ring depends on the radial symmetry of the beam. The histological results of the samples show that the damage zone of the laser cut is less than 10 μm. This demonstrates the possibility of replacing mechanical trephination in corneal surgery

Keywords

biomedical equipment; eye; laser applications in medicine; surgery; Q-switched Er:YAG laser; YAG:Er; YAl5O12:Er; axicon beam shaping; axicon-lens combination; controllable surface ablation; corneal surgery; damage zone; histological results; human eye-bank eyes; laser beam delivery system; laser cut; noncontact cornea trephination; radial symmetry; ring; Control systems; Laser ablation; Laser beam cutting; Laser beams; Laser surgery; Optical control; Optical design; Ring lasers; Shape control; Surface emitting lasers;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9197

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/3.64369

Filename

64369