CN217467338U

CN217467338U - Endoscope probe

Info

Publication number: CN217467338U
Application number: CN202220020073.7U
Authority: CN
Inventors: 朱瑞; 朱健; 郝成龙; 谭凤泽
Original assignee: Shenzhen Metalenx Technology Co Ltd
Current assignee: Shenzhen Metalenx Technology Co Ltd
Priority date: 2022-01-05
Filing date: 2022-01-05
Publication date: 2022-09-20
Anticipated expiration: 2032-01-05

Abstract

The application relates to an endoscope probe, which structurally comprises an optical fiber and a superlens; the superlens comprises a substrate and a supersurface structure, and is used for converging laser input by an optical fiber to a focus, so that focus tissue absorbs light energy and is converted into heat energy, and treatment means such as hemostasis or ablation and the like are implemented; and a protective layer is arranged on the super surface structure side of the super lens and is attached and connected with the end face of the optical fiber. The traditional lens is replaced by the superlens in the probe, so that the laser is focused, and the probe has the characteristics of lightness, thinness, simplicity, cheapness and high productivity; the probe has small volume and light weight, can go deep into a focus in an operation, is more flexible, and reduces an operation wound.

Description

Endoscope probe

Technical Field

The application belongs to the field of medical and surgical instruments, and particularly relates to an endoscope probe.

Background

Lasers have gained considerable attention in the field of surgery because of their very good cutting power, good coagulation and little thermal damage. The high-energy pulse laser generated by the laser is transmitted out through the optical fiber, the optical fiber enters the human body through the endoscope, the energy of the laser is transmitted into the part needing laser treatment, and effective and safe treatment is carried out on a patient by utilizing the characteristics of high energy, collimation, short action time, small heat affected area and the like of the laser.

In the endoscopic laser surgical equipment in the prior art, a plurality of laser beams, such as excitation laser and ablation laser, are generally coupled into a light path and transmitted to a probe through an optical fiber, the laser beams are converged through the probe, when the converged laser beams irradiate the surface of a tissue, the light energy absorbed by the tissue is converted into heat energy, a lesion focus with pathological changes is precisely ablated, and the protein of blood and the protein of the tissue can be coagulated to generate photocoagulation, so that small blood vessels are shrunk and closed, and the effect of stopping bleeding is achieved. The optical devices, such as lenses, used for focusing the laser in the probe make the probe difficult to reduce in size and heavy, which is not favorable for reducing the operation wound and difficult to penetrate into a complicated part.

SUMMERY OF THE UTILITY MODEL

In view of the above technical problem, the present application provides an endoscope probe including:

the optical fiber is used for transmitting laser required by laser surgery, and the tail end of the optical fiber is provided with an end face;

the super lens is arranged on the end face, comprises a substrate and a super surface structure and is used for converging the laser output by the optical fiber;

and a protective layer is arranged on the super surface structure side of the super lens.

Preferably, the optical fiber specifically comprises an optical fiber core and an optical fiber coating layer wrapped outside the optical fiber core; the fiber core is aligned with the super-surface structure.

Preferably, the super-surface structure comprises structural units arranged in an array; the structural unit comprises a plurality of nanostructures arranged on the surface of the substrate.

Preferably, the structural unit is a regular hexagon, and each vertex and/or central position of the regular hexagon is provided with at least one nano structure.

Preferably, the structural unit is a square, and each vertex and/or central position of the square is provided with at least one nano structure.

Preferably, a filling material is arranged between the nano structures; further, the absolute value of the difference between the refractive index of the filling material and the refractive index of the nano structure is greater than or equal to 0.5.

Preferably, the nanostructure is a polarization-dependent structure or a polarization-independent structure;

wherein the polarization-dependent structure comprises nanofins or nanoellipsoids and the polarization-independent structure comprises nanocylinders or nanosquares.

Preferably, the end face of the optical fiber is an inclined plane with respect to the optical fiber axis, and the superlens is a plane.

Preferably, the end face of the optical fiber is a convex curved surface inclined relative to the axis of the optical fiber, and the superlens is a curved surface matched with the shape of the end face.

Preferably, the operating wavelength of the superlens is one of the following intervals: 435 nm-390 nm; 577 nm-492 nm; 597nm to 577 nm.

Preferably, one side of the superlens protection layer is connected with the end face of the optical fiber, preferably in a fitting manner.

Preferably, the side of the superlens, on which the protective layer is not disposed, is connected, preferably attached, to the end face of the optical fiber.

The beneficial effects of this application technical scheme are:

1. the traditional lens is replaced by the superlens in the probe, so that the laser is focused, and the probe has the characteristics of lightness, thinness, simplicity, cheapness and high productivity; the probe has small volume and light weight, can go deep into a focus in an operation, is more flexible, and reduces the operation wound.

2. Through combining super Lens with the optic fibre, can realize bigger numerical aperture, and then compare in prior art, especially compare with self-focusing Lens (Grin Lens) and obtain better focus effect, consequently, the endoscope probe of this application can obtain showing littleer focus, and then can treat the biopsy body tissue more accurately, reduces required laser power, and can also avoid hindering the tissue of periphery. The same effect as a conventional lens can be achieved with a lower laser power in laser ablation procedures.

3. In the preferred scheme, the curved super lens is adopted, so that the focusing effect is better.

Drawings

FIG. 1 is a schematic view of a planar superlens embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 2 is a schematic view of an embodiment of a curved superlens of the present application;

FIG. 3 is a schematic illustration of a laser ablation procedure performed by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 4 is a schematic illustration of a laser hemostasis procedure performed by an embodiment of the present application;

FIG. 5 is a schematic view of a regular hexagonal structural unit;

FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of a square structural unit;

FIG. 7 is a schematic view of a nanocylinder in a building block;

FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram of a nano-square column in a structural unit.

The figure is marked with:

11 optical fiber cores, 12 optical fiber coating layers and 13 end faces;

110 inputting laser;

2 super lens, 21 substrate, 22 super surface structure and 23 protective layer.

Detailed Description

In this specification, it will be understood that when an element is referred to as being "on," "connected to" or "coupled to" another element relative to another element, such as other elements, it can be directly on, connected or coupled to the one element or intervening third elements may also be present. In contrast, when an element is referred to in this specification as being "directly on," "directly connected to," or "directly coupled to" other elements, relative to the other elements, there are no intervening elements present therebetween.

The present disclosure now will be described more fully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which embodiments are shown. This disclosure may, however, be embodied in many different forms and should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein. Rather, these embodiments are provided so that this disclosure will be thorough and complete, and will fully convey the scope of the disclosure to those skilled in the art. Like reference numerals refer to like parts throughout. Also, in the drawings, the thickness, ratio and size of the components are exaggerated for clarity of illustration.

The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting. As used herein, "a," "an," "the," and "at least one" do not denote a limitation of quantity, but rather are intended to include both the singular and the plural, unless the context clearly dictates otherwise. For example, "a component" means the same as "at least one component" unless the context clearly dictates otherwise. "at least one of" should not be construed as limited to the quantity "one". "or" means "and/or". The term "and/or" includes any and all combinations of one or more of the associated listed items.

The terms "lower", "upper" and "upper" are used to describe the positional relationship of the components shown in the drawings. These terms may be relative concepts and are described based on the orientation presented in the figures.

Unless otherwise defined, all terms used herein, including technical and scientific terms, have the same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. Terms defined in commonly used dictionaries should be interpreted as having the same meaning as is in the context of the relevant art and will not be interpreted in an idealized or overly formal sense unless expressly so defined herein.

The meaning of "comprising" or "comprises" indicates a property, a quantity, a step, an operation, a component, a part, or a combination thereof, but does not exclude other properties, quantities, steps, operations, components, parts, or combinations thereof.

Embodiments are described herein with reference to cross-sectional views that are idealized embodiments. Thus, variations from the shapes of the illustrations as a result, for example, of manufacturing techniques and/or tolerances, are to be expected. Thus, embodiments described herein should not be construed as limited to the particular shapes of regions as illustrated herein but are to include deviations in shapes that result, for example, from manufacturing. For example, regions shown or described as flat may typically have rough and/or nonlinear features. Also, the acute angles shown may be rounded. Thus, the regions illustrated in the figures are schematic in nature and their shapes are not intended to illustrate the precise shape of a region and are not intended to limit the scope of the claims.

Hereinafter, embodiments according to the present application will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings.

Embodiments of the present application include an endoscopic probe, as shown in fig. 1, comprising:

the optical fiber is used for transmitting laser required by laser surgery, the end of the optical fiber is provided with an end face 13, it is understood that the optical fiber can be a single-mode optical fiber or a multimode optical fiber, the optical fiber is connected with a laser source and can be a single laser source or a multi-laser source coupling, for example, the optical fiber comprises an excitation laser and an ablation laser, and the ablation laser emitted by the ablation laser is coupled into an optical path of the excitation laser in a coaxial mode to form a confocal endoscope system capable of simultaneously performing microscopy and laser ablation. Various lens groups, detectors, sensors or other optical components and the like can be arranged in the light path between the optical fiber and the laser source according to requirements. The optical fiber can be used for transmitting power laser for hemostasis or ablation operation, transmitting optical signals for transmitting images, controlling digital signals of related elements in the probe and the like.

A superlens 2 including a substrate 21 and a super surface structure 22 for converging laser light inputted from an optical fiber to a lesion; in a preferred embodiment, the superlens base is sized to be the same size as the fiber end face, with the edges aligned to ensure alignment of the supersurface structure portion with the fiber core. The supplementary explanation of the superlens in the embodiment is that the superlens is a kind of supersurface. The super surface is a layer of sub-wavelength artificial nano-structure film, and incident light can be modulated according to super surface structure units on the super surface. The super-surface structure unit comprises a full-medium or plasma nano antenna, and the phase, amplitude, polarization and other characteristics of light can be directly adjusted and controlled. In this example, the nanostructure is an all-dielectric structural unit, and has high transmittance in the visible light band, and the selectable materials include: titanium oxide, silicon nitride, fused silica, aluminum oxide, gallium nitride, gallium phosphide, amorphous silicon, crystalline silicon, hydrogenated amorphous silicon, and the like.

And a protective layer 23 is arranged on the side of the super surface structure 22 of the super lens 2 and is attached and connected with the end face 13 of the optical fiber. It should be understood that the conformable connection herein includes, but is not limited to, adhesive bonding, structural attachment, splicing, heat staking, setting up an auxiliary structural encasement, and the like. The protective layer 23 may be a layered structure plated on the superlens 2, and should partially or completely cover the super-surface structure 22 to avoid damaging the super-surface structure 22 during the assembly process. The protective layer should be a material that is transparent with respect to the operating band. The super-surface structure 22 can face inward, that is, the surface of the super-lens 2 with the protective layer 23 and the super-surface structure 22 is connected with the end surface, so that the damage to the super-surface structure in the operation process can be avoided. Or the surface of the superlens 2 without the super-surface structure 22 and the protective layer 23 may be attached to the end surface 13, and the connection surface of the superlens 2 and the end surface 13 may be adjusted according to actual requirements or production processes.

Supplementary description of the examples: fig. 3 shows a schematic diagram of an endoscopic probe for laser ablation operation in an embodiment, laser transmitted by an optical fiber is converged at a lesion focus after passing through a super lens, and the main function of the super lens is to converge an optical beam and converge laser energy at one point. The principle is that when the converged laser irradiates the surface of the tissue, the light energy absorbed by the tissue is converted into heat energy, and the lesion focus which generates pathological changes is accurately ablated. Compared with the traditional lens, the super lens has smaller focal point and can realize accurate ablation. On the other hand, the endoscope probe in the embodiment can also be used for performing laser hemostasis surgery, as shown in fig. 4, the laser transmitted by the optical fiber is converged on the surface of the post-surgery bleeding living tissue after passing through the super lens, and the main function of the super lens is to converge the light beam and converge the laser energy at one point. The principle is that when the converged laser irradiates the surface of the tissue, the light energy absorbed by the tissue is converted into heat energy, so that the protein of blood and the tissue is coagulated, the photocoagulation effect is generated, and the small blood vessels are contracted and closed, thereby achieving the effect of stopping bleeding. It should be understood that the operating band of choice in laser ablation surgery and laser hemostasis is related to the particular body tissue being affected. In laser ablation procedures, wavelengths are selected that are capable of being applied to and strongly absorbed by the target tissue. The penetration depth of the laser in the tissue is proportional to the wavelength of the laser, and the laser wavelength should be selected in consideration of the penetration force of the laser, wherein the deeper the lesion, the longer the laser wavelength is required. In laser hemostasis surgery, there are three peaks of oxyhemoglobin absorption in intravascular blood, 418nm, 542nm, and 577 nm. Therefore, the material of the super-lens substrate and the material of the super-surface structure unit can be adjusted to adapt to the wavelength, and the selection of the protective layer of the super-surface structure should be correspondingly adjusted in the same way.

In a preferred embodiment, the optical fiber specifically comprises an optical fiber core 11 and an optical fiber coating layer 12 wrapping the optical fiber core 11, the optical fiber coating layer is used for protecting the surface of the optical fiber from being scratched by damp gas and external force, so that the optical fiber is endowed with the functions of improving the microbending resistance and reducing the microbending additional loss of the optical fiber, and the optical fiber coating layer can be a layer of elastic coating solidified by ultraviolet light, such as acrylate, silicone rubber, nylon and other materials. Because the edge is easy to tilt and degum when the super lens 2 is attached to the end face, especially the curved end face, in the specific embodiment, the super surface structure 22 is only arranged at the central part of the substrate, namely, the position corresponding to the fiber core of the optical fiber, and the position which can not receive the laser at the periphery is not provided with the super surface structure but is directly filled with the protective layer 23, so that the edge part of the super lens 2 is more closely attached, the fiber core 11 of the optical fiber and the super surface structure 22 are required to be aligned, namely, the laser can be accurately shot into the super surface structure 22, and the focusing effect is ensured.

In a preferred embodiment, the super-surface structure 22 comprises an array of structural units; the structural unit comprises at least one nano-structure arranged on the surface of the substrate. Furthermore, the structural unit is a regular hexagon, and at least one nano structure is arranged at each vertex and central position of the regular hexagon. Or the structural unit is a square, and at least one nano structure is arranged at each vertex and the central position of the square. Ideally, the structural units should be nanostructures arranged at the vertices and centers of a hexagon or nanostructures arranged at the vertices and centers of a square, and it should be understood that the actual product may have the loss of the nanostructures at the edges of the superlens due to the limitation of the shape of the superlens, so that the actual product does not satisfy the complete hexagon/square. Specifically, as shown in fig. 5 or fig. 6, the structural units are formed by regularly arranging nanostructures, and a plurality of structural units are arranged in an array to form a super-surface structure. One embodiment, as shown in fig. 5, includes a central nanostructure surrounded by 6 peripheral nanostructures at equal distances, each of which is circumferentially distributed to form a regular hexagon, which can also be understood as a combination of regular triangles formed by a plurality of nanostructures. One embodiment, as shown in fig. 6, is a central nanostructure surrounded by 4 peripheral nanostructures spaced equally apart from each other to form a square. The nanostructure with the closest phase can be searched in the nanostructure database according to the phase required by the nanostructure at different wavelengths.

Supplementary explanations for the examples are: the nanostructure should have high transmittance for the operating band, and the selectable materials include: titanium oxide, silicon nitride, fused silica, aluminum oxide, gallium nitride, gallium phosphide, amorphous silicon, crystalline silicon, hydrogenated amorphous silicon, and the like.

In a preferred embodiment, a filling material is arranged between the nano-structures; the absolute value of the difference between the refractive index of the filling material and the refractive index of the nano structure is greater than or equal to 0.5. In particular, the filling material may be an air-filled or other transparent or translucent material with an operating wavelength band.

In a preferred embodiment, the nanostructure is a polarization-dependent structure or a polarization-independent structure; wherein, as shown in fig. 7 or fig. 8, the polarization dependent structure comprises nanofins or nanoellipsoids, which exert a geometric phase on incident light; the polarization-independent structures comprise nanocylinders or nanosquares, which impose a propagation phase on the incident light.

In a preferred embodiment, the end face 13 of the fiber is a plane inclined with respect to the fiber axis, and the base 21 of the superlens 2 is a plane. Further, the super lens 2 can also be made into a curved surface, as shown in fig. 2, the super lens is a convex curved surface, the focusing effect of the super lens based on the curved surface is better, and the generated focus is smaller when the same light beam is incident, which is more beneficial to improving the effect of the laser surgery. When a curved-surface superlens is adopted, the superlens substrate is made of a flexible material so as to be effectively attached to the curved-surface end face 13. The end face 13 and the superlens may be bonded by an adhesive or by thermal fusion, or by other means known to those skilled in the art.

In a preferred embodiment, the operating wavelength of the superlens is one of the following intervals: 435 nm-390 nm; 577 nm-492 nm; 597nm to 577nm to adapt to the absorption peak of oxyhemoglobin in blood vessels.

In a preferred embodiment, the optical fiber can be further connected with an optical fiber rotating joint, so that the endoscope probe can rotate, and the adjustment during operation is convenient, and the laser beam can be oriented to the position needing to be aligned in the operation.

The above embodiments are only used to illustrate the technical solution of the present invention, and not to limit it; although the present invention has been described in detail with reference to the foregoing embodiments, it should be understood by those skilled in the art that: the technical solutions described in the foregoing embodiments may still be modified, or some technical features may be equivalently replaced; such modifications and substitutions do not depart from the spirit and scope of the present invention in its corresponding aspects.

Claims

1. An endoscopic probe, comprising:

the optical fiber is used for transmitting laser required by laser surgery, and the tail end of the optical fiber is provided with an end face (13);

a superlens (2) disposed on the end face (13), including a substrate (21) and a super-surface structure (22), for converging laser light output by the optical fiber;

wherein a protective layer (23) is arranged on the super surface structure (22) side of the super lens (2);

wherein the end face (13) of the optical fiber is a plane inclined with respect to the axis of the optical fiber or a convex curved surface.

2. The endoscopic probe according to claim 1, wherein said optical fiber comprises an optical fiber core (11) and an optical fiber coating layer (12) wrapped outside said optical fiber core (11); the fiber core (11) is aligned with the super-surface structure (22).

3. The endoscopic probe according to claim 1, wherein said super-surface structure (22) comprises structural units arranged in an array; the structural unit comprises a plurality of nanostructures arranged on the surface of the substrate (21).

4. The endoscopic probe according to claim 3, wherein said structural units are regular hexagons provided with at least one nanostructure at each vertex and/or central position.

5. The endoscopic probe according to claim 3, wherein said structural unit is a square, said square being provided with at least one nanostructure at each apex and/or central position.

6. The endoscopic probe according to claim 3, wherein a filler material is disposed between said nanostructures.

7. The endoscopic probe according to claim 6, wherein an absolute value of a difference between a refractive index of said filler material and a refractive index of said nanostructure is 0.5 or more.

8. The endoscopic probe according to claim 3, wherein said nanostructure is a polarization dependent structure or a polarization independent structure;

9. The endoscopic probe according to claim 1, wherein said superlens (2) is a flat surface adapted to the shape and size of said end face (13).

10. The endoscopic probe according to claim 1, wherein said superlens (2) is a curved surface adapted to the shape of said end face (13).

11. The endoscopic probe according to claim 1, wherein said superlens (2) has an operating wavelength in one of the following ranges: 435 nm-390 nm; 577 nm-492 nm; 597 nm-577 nm.

12. The endoscopic probe according to claim 1, wherein a side of the superlens (2) provided with the protective layer (23) is connected to the end face (13) of the optical fiber.

13. The endoscopic probe according to claim 1, wherein a side of the superlens (2) on which the protective layer (23) is not provided is connected to the end face (13) of the optical fiber.

14. An endoscopic probe according to claim 12 or 13, wherein said connection is a snug connection.