Experimental results of fiberoptical delivery and a reaction on atherosclerotic tissue using a long pulse excimer laser are described. In order to improve the maximum energy delivered through optical fiber, a long pulse excimer laser which had the pulse duration of 100nsec was examined. The quartz fibers with both 300 and 400μm core diameter were used for the laser energy delivery. As a result, the maximum energies transmitted through optical fiber were 30mJ/pulse with 400μm core fiber and 16mJ/pulse with 300μm core fiber. And the average energies transmitted constantly were 20mJ/pulse and 10mJ/pulse with 400μm core fiber and 300μm core fiber, respectively. The energies were about 3 times lager than these using a conventional short pulse excimer laser. The laser energy delivered through the fiber was irradiated on the sample of atherosclerotic aorta of a rabbit in saline to investigate the tissue reaction on atheroma. The result shows that the fiberoptically delivered energy of long pulse excimer laser was enough for the destruction of atherosclerotic tissue.
