Photon “recycling” improves laser outcomes
“Photon recycling” can enhance cutaneous response to lasers, according to a new study published in Lasers in Surgery and Medicine.
The study set out to determine if returning reflected light to the skin could enhance its response, whatever the type of laser treatment. Dr E Victor Ross and his team tested the hypothesis that returning or “recycling” the incident laser light reflected off the skin – which can be up to 70% depending on wavelength and pigmentation – to the site of laser exposure could improve treatment outcome.
“We performed the study to determine if there was a real role for photon recycling in a clinical device,” said Dr Ross. “We made a working prototype photon recycler and showed that it increases skin response to laser exposure. “The recycler recovers lost photons and returns them like a boomerang to the skin surface. In the red and near-infrared spectral region, photon recycling could produce very large improvements in the energy available for treatment.”
