Title :
Energy scaling in 3 micron erbium-based lasers
Author :
Shori, Ramesh K.
Author_Institution :
Electr. Eng. Dept., California Univ., Los Angeles, CA, USA
Abstract :
Laser emission in the 3-μm region is particular interest for clinical applications because of strong absorption in liquid water and hydroxyapatite, two of the major components that account for as much as 60-80% of the bulk composition of soft and hard (i.e. bones, enamel in teeth) tissues, respectively. For surgical application, short pulses on the order of few tens of nanoseconds are desirable in order to minimize the thermal damage to the surrounding tissue. In addition to clinical applications, Q-switched 3-μm lasers are also of great interest for some military applications where the 3-μm lasers can act as the pump sources for OPOs to generate continuously tunable emission in the 3-14 μm region.
Keywords :
Q-switching; bone; erbium; high-speed optical techniques; laser applications in medicine; light sources; optical parametric oscillators; optical pumping; 3 to 14 micron; Er; Q-switching; bulk composition; clinical application; energy scaling; erbium-based lasers; hydroxyapatite; laser emission; liquid water; military application; nanosecond; short pulse; surgical application; thermal damage; tunable emission; Absorption; Bones; Laser applications; Laser excitation; Laser surgery; Pump lasers; Teeth; Tunable circuits and devices;
Conference_Titel :
Lasers and Electro-Optics Society, 2003. LEOS 2003. The 16th Annual Meeting of the IEEE
Print_ISBN :
0-7803-7888-1
DOI :
10.1109/LEOS.2003.1253079
