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US 6,200,309 B1Granted
Photodynamic therapy system and method using a phased array raman laser amplifier
AssigneeMcDonnell Douglas Corporation
InventorsRobert R. Rice, Mark S. Zediker
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Abstract
System and method for photodynamic therapy using a phased array Raman laser amplifier including a beam generator for generating a fundamental laser beam and a Raman seed frequency laser beam, and a fiber optic laser amplifier array for forming a diffraction limited output laser beam at the Raman seed frequency by amplifying the fundamental laser beam to a power level corresponding to the Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS) threshold to thereby pump the SRS process and provide Raman gain to the Raman seed frequency laser beam.
Claims17
A method of photodynamic therapy, comprising the steps of:
- contacting tumor cells with a photosensitizer compound;
- irradiating said tumor cells in the presence of said photosensitizer compound with a laser beam at a light wavelength effective to excite said photosensitizer compound to cause cytotoxic effects upon the tumor cells, wherein said laser beam is generated using a phased array Raman laser amplifier including:
- (a) a beam generator generating a fundamental laser beam and a Raman seed frequency laser beam, and (b) a laser amplifier array forming a diffraction limited output laser beam at the Raman seed frequency by amplifying said fundamental laser beam to a power level corresponding to a Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS) threshold to thereby pump the SRS process and provide Raman gain to the Raman seed frequency laser beam.
A method of photodynamic therapy, comprising the steps of:
- contacting tumor cells with a photosensitizer compound;
- irradiating said tumor cells in the presence of said photosensitizer compound with a laser beam at a light wavelength effective to excite said photosensitizer compound to cause cytotoxic effects upon the tumor cells, wherein said laser beam is generated using a phased array Raman laser amplifier including:
- (a) first means for generating a fundamental laser beam, (b) second means for generating a Raman seed frequency laser beam, (c) third means for combining said fundamental laser beam and said Raman seed frequency laser beams, (d) fourth means for generating N fundamental laser beams and for generating N Raman seed frequency laser beams responsive to the combined fundamental laser beam and Raman seed frequency laser beams, (e) fifth means for amplifying the power level of each of said N fundamental laser beams to a Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS) threshold associated with said fifth means to thereby pump the SRS process so as to provide Raman gain for each of said N Raman seed frequency laser beams to thereby produced N amplified Raman seed frequency laser beams, and (f) sixth means for combining said N amplified Raman seed frequency laser beams to thereby produce a diffraction limited output laser beam.
A method of photodynamic therapy, comprising the steps of:
- contacting tumor cells with a photosensitizer compound;
- irradiating said tumor cells in the presence of said photosensitizer compound with a laser beam at a light wavelength effective to excite said photosensitizer compound to cause cytotoxic effects upon the tumor cells, wherein said laser beam is generated using a phased array Raman laser amplifier including (a) a beam generator for generating a fundamental laser beam and a Raman seed frequency laser beam, and (b) a fiber optic laser amplifier for forming a diffraction limited output laser beam at the Raman seed frequency by amplifying the fundamental and Raman seed frequency laser beams by Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS), in which the use of said phased array Raman laser amplifier comprises the substeps of:
- (i) generating a fundamental laser beam;
- (ii) generating a Raman seed frequency laser beam;
- (iii) generating N fundamental laser beams responsive to said fundamental laser beam;
- (iv) generating N Raman seed frequency laser beams responsive to said Raman seed frequency laser beam;
- (v) amplifying the power level of each of said N fundamental laser beams to a Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS) threshold associated with the fiber optic laser amplifier to thereby pump the SRS process so as to provide Raman gain for each of said N Raman seed frequency laser beams to thereby produced N amplified Raman seed frequency laser beams;
- and
- (vi) combining said N amplified Raman seed frequency laser beams to thereby produce the diffraction limited output laser beam.
6 more elements
A method of photodynamic therapy using a light source generating a precise output wavelength in a laser amplifier array, comprising the steps of:
- contacting tumor cells with a photosensitizer compound;
- irradiating said tumor cells in the presence of said photosensitizer compound with a laser beam at a light wavelength effective to excite said photosensitizer compound to cause cytotoxic effects upon the tumor cells, wherein said laser beam is generated using a phased array Raman laser amplifier including (a) a beam generator for generating a fundamental laser beam and a Raman seed frequency laser beam, and (b) a fiber optic laser amplifier for forming a diffraction limited output laser beam at the Raman seed frequency by amplifying the fundamental and Raman seed frequency laser beams by Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS), in which the use of said phased array Raman laser amplifier
- applying a frequency-locked Raman seed frequency laser beam and a fundamental laser beam to the laser amplifier array:
- and
- generating an output laser beam using a Stimulated Raman Scattering (SRS) process whereby the majority of the power of said output laser beam is at the frequency-locked Raman seed frequency.
2 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.