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This paper describes a flexible microplasma jet device using a Tygon® S-54-HL tube as a biocompatible tube and its potential in developing cancer therapies. The optical and physical properties of the plasma jets and preliminary apoptosis data of cultured murine tumor cells and nontumor fibroblast cells treated with these plasma jets are presented. Microplasma jets were observed to induce apoptosis in cultured murine cells in a dose-dependent manner. The murine melanoma tumor cells were more sensitive to plasma treatment than fibroblast cells. These features allow the direct and precise application of this microplasma jet device to tumor cells.

Intense and energetic atmospheric plasma emissions were achieved by direct jet‐to‐jet coupling using honeycomb‐structured quartz tube arrays. Two plasma modes were found to exist in the same plasma array structure under a change of gas flow conditions: an intense plasma mode and the well‐collimated plasma mode. In order to describe the direct jet‐to‐jet coupling by electrical coupling of charged particles in the plasma, the optical emission of the plasma array was compared with that of a single tube plasma jet. Under identical electrical driving and gas conditions, the optical intensity from the intense plasma jet was approximately four times larger in the coupled array than in the single plasma jet structure. Additionally, the electron energy in the intense plasma was larger than that of the well‐collimated plasma jets in the same device. This intense and energetic plasma jet, arising through direct jet‐to‐jet coupling, may provide novel applications requiring strong discharge processes using simplified structures and accompanying instrumentation when compared with the present vacuum plasma systems.

A flexible microplasma endoscope based on a 15 μm hollow-core glass optical fiber is fabricated, and tumor cell apoptotic analysis supports its potential use in targeted cancer therapies. The optical-fiber microplasma jet reveals antitumor activity at a certain plasma dose in animal studies.

A flexible microplasma jet device with a hollow‐core optical fiber produces a plasma plume that is quite narrow but long enough to apply direct treatment to single‐tumor cells. The microplasma induces apoptosis in murine melanoma cells in a dose‐dependent manner, and under certain conditions can selectively destroy tumor cells with no harm to murine fibroblasts