Nanoscale Helium Ion Microscopic Analysis of Collagen Fibrillar Changes Following Femtosecond Laser Dissection of Human Cornea
Over the last decade, femtosecond lasers have emerged as an important tool to perform accurate and fine dissections with minimal collateral damage in biological tissue. The most common surgical procedure in medicine utilizing femtosecond laser is LASIK. During the femtosecond laser
dissection process, the corneal collagen fibers inevitably undergo biomechanical and thermal changes on a sub-micro- or even a nanoscale level, which can potentially lead to post-surgical complications. In this study, we utilized helium ion microscopy, complemented with transmission electron
microscopy to examine the femtosecond laser-induced collagen fibrillar damage in ex vivo human corneas. We found that the biomechanical damage induced by laser etching, generation of tissue bridges, and expansion of cavitation bubble and its subsequent collapse, created distortion to the surrounding
collagen lamellae. Femtosecond laser-induced thermal damage was characterized by collapsed collagen lamellae, loss of collagen banding, collagen coiling, and presence of spherical debris. Our findings have shown the ability of helium ion microscopy to provide high resolution images with unprecedented
detail of nanoscale fibrillar morphological changes in order to assess a tissue damage, which could not be resolved by conventional scanning electron microscopy previously. This imaging technology has also given us a better understanding of the tissue-laser interactions in a nano-structural
manner and their possible effects on post-operative wound recovery.
Keywords: CAVITATION BUBBLE; COLLAGEN; CORNEA; FEMTOSECOND LASER; HELIUM ION MICROSCOPY; LASIK; PHOTODISRUPTION; PLASMA
Document Type: Research Article
Publication date: 01 August 2014
- Journal of Biomedical Nanotechnology (JBN) is a peer-reviewed multidisciplinary journal providing broad coverage in all research areas focused on the applications of nanotechnology in medicine, drug delivery systems, infectious disease, biomedical sciences, biotechnology, and all other related fields of life sciences.
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