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Numerical analysis of costal cartilage warping after laser modification

Grafts obtained from peripheral regions of costal cartilage have an inherent tendency to warp over time. Laser irradiation provides a potential method to control the warping process, thus yielding stable grafts for facial reconstructive surgery. In our current study, we propose a simple and well-fitting model that numerically describes the degree of warping of laser irradiated costal cartilage grafts. Using an Nd:YAG laser (lambda=1.32 µm) at various exposure settings, grafts harvested from the peripheral regions of porcine costal cartilage were irradiated. The resulting graft geometry was fitted to a curve using a quadratic regression model. The coefficient of determination demonstrated a very strong fit for all grafts modeled. A quadratic regression is simple to perform and results in a single numerical value that appropriately describes the degree of cartilage warping. Our proposed model is valuable in assessing the effect of laser irradiation on the warping process of costal cartilage.

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Open Access This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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Foulad, A., Manuel, C., Kim, J. et al. Numerical analysis of costal cartilage warping after laser modification. Head Neck Oncol 2 (Suppl 1), O22 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1186/1758-3284-2-S1-O22

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/1758-3284-2-S1-O22

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