News — fused silica

What are Holmium Laser Fiber Sizes, Really?

AccuFlex Accumax AccuTrac ACMI laser fiber calculase dornier Duotome EndoBeam Fiber Flexiva fused silica high power fiber optics Holmium Fiber Holmium Laser holmium laser fiber karl storz laser fiber Laser Lithotripsy Lasersafe litho laser Lumenis medilase medilase H20 microlenses OmniPulse optical fiber Optifiber ProFlex ProFlex LLF ProGlide ProGuard richard wolf scope safe Scopesafe Slimline stonelight SureFlex tapered fibers Thulium thulium laser thulium laser fiber TracTip Trimedyne yellowstone

What are Holmium Laser Fiber Sizes, Really?

Section 502 of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA) says that a device is misbranded if its labeling is false or misleading in any particular. Maybe the FDA doesn’t read Urology? I’m referring to a paper that appeared in the journal Urology a couple of years ago*, questioning the veracity of holmium laser fiber manufacturers in describing the diameters of their fiber devices. The conclusion was that nobody told the truth. That would actually be a good case against holmium fibers being misbranded, in that, if all fibers are uniformly mislabeled, it is not misleading. While the cynic in me appreciates that...

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The Power of Collimation III: Moses’ Enthalpy

2100nm AccuFlex Accumax AccuTrac ACMI laser fiber calculase dornier EndoBeam Fiber Flexiva fused silica high power fiber optics Holmium Fiber Holmium Laser holmium laser fiber karl storz Laser laser fiber Laser Lithotripsy Lasersafe litho laser Lumenis medilase medilase H20 microlenses optical fiber Optifiber ProFlex ProFlex LLF ProGlide ProGuard quanta laser richard wolf scope safe Scopesafe SideLite Slimline stonelight SureFlex tapered fibers TracTip Trimedyne yellowstone

The Power of Collimation III: Moses’ Enthalpy

At InnovaQuartz, we developed a method of making very precise, tiny lenses directly upon the face of an optical fiber. In this third Chapter of The Power of Collimation, I’ll describe just how important this subtle feature really is to the performance of holmium laser URS. In the first Chapter of this blog series, I discussed why holmium lasers launch light into fibers at a substantial fraction of their maximum propagation angle (near maximum NA). We’ll be using computer-generated ray traces to depict what happens with a typical laser focus condition (aka laser launch condition) when coupling to a series of...

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The Power of Collimation I: “I’m going to focus like a laser beam…”

2100nm AccuFlex Accumax AccuTrac ACMI laser fiber calculase dornier EndoBeam Flexiva fused silica high power fiber optics Holmium Fiber Holmium Laser holmium laser fiber karl storz Laser laser fiber Laser Lithotripsy Lasersafe litho laser Lumenis medilase medilase H20 OmniPulse optical fiber Optifiber ProFlex ProFlex LLF ProGuard quanta laser richard wolf scope safe Scopesafe Slimline stonelight tapered fibers TracTip Trimedyne yellowstone

The Power of Collimation I: “I’m going to focus like a laser beam…”

Bill Clinton and George W Bush both promised to 'focus like a laser' on the economy. I'll leave the politics to others and focus like a lens on the lack of scientific rigor for this turn of phrase. At risk of appearing pedantic, I have to point out that lasers aren’t actually focused at all. In fact, collimation (parallelism) is one of the characteristics of laser light that make it unique and useful. Lenses are required to focus laser light. You may ask yourself, “So what? It’s a minor exploitation of poetic license.” I agree, but I needed an entrée suitable for...

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Instructions: IQ’s Sapphire™ Wafers for Cutting GC Capillary Columns

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Instructions: IQ’s Sapphire™ Wafers for Cutting GC Capillary Columns

Cutting capillary and making gas-tight seals is critical to good GC practice and making seals on silica press-fit connectors requires almost perfect cuts (unless you are using Pres2fit™ connectors). Cleanly cut ends are also important for CE for minimizing distortions of the electric field at the column ends.  Capillary: The first thing that the separation scientist needs to understand is that not all silica capillary is the same. There are three major producers of GC and CE capillary around the world in Australia, Germany and in the USA. While very similar in materials of production, the differences in production methods...

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Smooth Passage™ Holmium Fiber Tips on ProFlex™ LLF

2100nm AccuFlex Accumax AccuTrac ACMI laser fiber calculase chips Clean cut cutting fiber dornier Duotome EndoBeam Fiber Flexiva fused silica GreenLight high power fiber optics Holmium Fiber Holmium Laser holmium laser fiber karl storz KTP Laser Laser laser fiber Laser Lithotripsy laser machining Lasersafe litho laser Lumenis medilase medilase H20 micromachining MoXy OmniPulse optical fiber Optifiber ProFlex ProFlex LLF ProGlide ProGuard Prostate Surgery quanta laser richard wolf scope safe Scopesafe SideLite Slimline stonelight SureFlex Thulium thulium laser thulium laser fiber TracTip Trimedyne yellowstone

Smooth Passage™ Holmium Fiber Tips on ProFlex™ LLF

In the course of studying other manufacturers' holmium laser fibers we sometimes observe surprising differences. In this case, we knew that our tips were different -- heck, we gave them a special name -- but  just how much difference they made was the surprise.      The two fibers in the photo are "1000 micron", meaning they have either a 910 μm or 940 μm core inside a 1 mm diameter glass cladding. The upper one was made by the manufacturer of the laser upon which the two fibers were used and the lower one is our Smooth Passage™ Tip on ProFlex™ LLF. Both fibers...

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