New Technology: Femtosecond Laser May be Used for Future Acupuncture Therapy

Abstract

Additional information is available at the end of the chapter http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/54315. Introduction "cupuncture therapy is utilized to cure many diseases and to maintain health. We have been studying the molecular mechanism of acupuncture and obtained its molecular evidence [ -]. The World Health Organization has listed more than indications for acupuncture [ ], and the National Institutes of Health NIH has accepted the validity of acupuncture treatment [ , ]. One of the popular uses of acupuncture treatment is to treat muscle exhaustion, including stiff shoulders. Major acupuncture techniques involve penetration of the skin by thin, solid metallic needles, which are manipulated manually or are stimulated electrically. The efficacy of such muscle therapy is attributed to the overproliferation of muscle cells induced by the damage of muscle in response to the needle penetration. We recently reported that myostatin gene expression is suppressed by electroacupuncture E" [ ].However, we cannot exclude the possibility of infection for use of acupuncture, and thus a noncontact method without using needles is needed. Furthermore the laser treatment has a potential for high-throughput therapy. When an intense femtosecond laser is focused on biological tissue, laser ablation is induced at the laser focal spot. Since the main component of the tissue is water, the initiation process occurs with the mutual interaction between water molecules and the femtosecond laser pulse. In comparison with picosecond or nanosecond laser irradiation, the excitation energy of water molecules after the femtosecond laser irradiation is effectively converted to energy to generate shock and stress waves [ , ]. This means simultaneously that heat generation at the laser focal spot is suppressed because of effective energy conversion to these kinetic waves [ ]. "s a result, when the femtosecond laser is focused on the tissue with suitable irradiation conditions, we can expect that the tissue will be stimulated mechanically, rather than thermally, by the photomechanical ablation. In previous studies we realized several single-cell manipulation techniques using shock and stress waves under a microscope, including noncontact detachment of an animal cell from its cultured substrate [ , ], control of cell multiplication [ ], and estimation of intercellular adhesion strength [ , ]. These techniques can be utilized not only for single cells but also for tissues and organs of living animal. "s one of the promising approach, our attention is directed to acupuncture treatment.In this study, we focused a femtosecond laser FL on the skin of the hind leg muscles of living mice and investigated the clinical influence of the common acupuncture "CP on muscle disease via histological examination and expression analysis of the gene encoding myostatin [ ]. In the histological examination, we observed damage of the skeletal muscle due to the femtosecond laser irradiation. We then used real-time PCR to estimate the gene expression and western blotting to est...

Efficacy of femtosecond lasers for application of acupuncture therapy

“…In this study, our analysis here demonstrated significant reduction of Mstn gene expression in both FL and ACP groups compared with the control group (Fig. 2a ), which was consistent with our previous data [ 11 ]. We investigated the Mstn protein level, which significantly decreased in skeletal muscles after FL irradiation, as Fig.…”

“…We previously measured serum creatine kinase (CK) activity to study the damage to skeletal muscle by FL irradiation [ 11 ]. Our results showed no difference in the CK activity levels between the FL and control groups, but the CK level in the ACP group, which had acupuncture needles inserted into skeletal muscle, was significantly greater than that in the other two groups (Fig.…”

“…4 ). The damage caused by FL irradiation was observed in the epidermis and dermis but did not reach the skeletal muscle, according to histological analysis [ 4 , 11 ]. The depth of the damaged area was approximately 1100 μm.…”

“…Protein samples were analyzed by using sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, after which they were transferred to polyvinylidene fluoride membranes (Amersham, Piscataway, NJ). Separated polypeptides were analyzed via Western blotting as previously described [ 11 ]. Primary antibodies included polyclonal anti-Mstn antibody (Millipore, Billerica, MA) and α-tubulin loading control (Abcam, Cambridge, MA).…”

“…Other results showed that EA-induced Mstn gene suppression may help prevent muscle atrophy in mice [ 10 ]. We subsequently found suppression of expression of the Mstn gene in mouse skeletal muscle after FL irradiation, just as with EA [ 4 , 11 ].…”