Ultrashort Laser Pulses In Biology And Medicine (biological And Medical Physics, Biomedical Engineering)

Sources of ultrashort laser pulses are nowadays commercially available and have entered many areas of research and development. This book gives an overview of biological and medical applications of these laser pulses. The briefness of these laser pulses permits the tracing of the fastest processes in photo-active bio-systems, which is one focus of the book. The other focus is applications that rely on the high peak intensity of ultrashort laser pulses. Examples covered span non-linear imaging techniques, optical tomography, and laser surgery. Front Matter....Pages i-xv Front Matter....Pages 1-1 Ultrahigh-Resolution Optical Coherence Tomography Using Femtosecond Lasers....Pages 3-27 Two-Photon Laser Scanning Microscopy....Pages 29-51 Femtosecond Lasers in Ophthalmology: Surgery and Imaging....Pages 53-73 Front Matter....Pages 75-75 Ultrafast Peptide and Protein Dynamics by Vibrational Spectroscopy....Pages 77-94 Photosynthetic Light-Harvesting....Pages 95-115 Primary Photosynthetic Energy Conversion in Bacterial Reaction Centers....Pages 117-140 Ultrafast Primary Reactions in the Photosystems of Oxygen-Evolving Organisms....Pages 141-164 Primary Photochemistry in the Photoactive Yellow Protein: The Prototype Xanthopsin....Pages 165-199 Structure Based Kinetics by Time-Resolved X-ray Crystallography....Pages 201-241 Primary Reactions in Retinal Proteins....Pages 243-277 Ultrashort Laser Pulses in Single Molecule Spectroscopy....Pages 279-309 Back Matter....Pages 311-320 Learn about the many biological and medical applications of ultrashort laser pulses. The authors highlight and explain how the briefness of these laser pulses permits the tracing of even the fastest processes in photo-active bio-systems. They also present a variety of applications that rely on the high peak intensity of ultrashort laser pulses.