Abstract
The purpose of this chapter is to provide a discussion of the basic physical principles involved in the operation of the laser. Although an in-depth discussion of the physical principles involved in the generation and control of a laser beam can involve complicated mathematical and theoretical physics, the inclusion of complicated concepts is not requisite to an understanding of these principles sufficient for the surgeon. Only those principles necessary to maximize the effectiveness of the laser in various neurosurgical applications will be presented in this discussion. Several recent reviews on the subject are available, which may provide additional information [2–5, 7, 8].
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© 1988 Kluwer Academic Publishers
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Clark, W.C. (1988). Fundamentals of Laser Physics. In: Robertson, J.H., Clark, W.C. (eds) Lasers in Neurosurgery. Foundations of Neurological Surgery, vol 1. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-1763-0_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-1763-0_3
Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA
Print ISBN: 978-1-4612-8989-0
Online ISBN: 978-1-4613-1763-0
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