Key Features – Our Technology
Astanza’s commitment is to tattoo removal technology, and our lasers incorporate proven science that’s innovative and effective.
Two Powerful Wavelengths
The Duality produces a true 1 Joule pulse of 1064nm energy to removal of dark tattoos, in addition to an industry-leading 500mJ of 532nm energy, both with a flat-top beam profile. If you’ve been having trouble removing difficult tattoos with your existing laser, the Duality tattoo removal laser may provide the extra energy you are looking for.
The Nd:YAG laser produces light at 1064nm through exciting the atoms of a Neodymium-doped yttrium aluminum garnet crystal. This wavelength is highly effective at treating dark tattoos but allows for minimal absorption by melanin. This means that tattoo ink will shatter and that even patients of darker skin types will see minimal disruption of skin tone.
The 1064nm light is then passed through a highly-efficient non-linear KTP crystal to produce what is called “frequency-doubled” 532nm light. This light, which appears green, is effective at addressing tattoo ink of a complementary color – in this case red, orange, and yellow.
Nd:YAG lasers have been used in aesthetic applications for over two decades, but it is the precise way that the energy is produced, pulsed, and delivered through Astanza tattoo removal technology that makes the difference.
TruePower
Astanza laser offers TruePower to our practitioners. The wavelengths of light our lasers produce offer maximum fluence sufficient to shatter the ink in difficult-to-remove tattoos. Unlike other lasers that can’t offer effective treatments beyond the first few treatments, the Duality pushes through barriers to help you complete follow-up treatments and offer complete removal of stubborn ink.
The Duality creates TruePower through using large cylindrical crystals inside industry-leading optical cavities, multiple flash lamps, and precision optics that minimize energy bleed. Our lasers are slightly larger – and significantly more powerful – than the competition.
Active Q-Switching
Active q-switching is a technique that allows for the production of truly powerful pulses from a laser through active loss modulation. In the Duality, the laser’s crystal is continuously pumped while the energy extraction of light is prevented by keeping resonator losses high. Then, power is applied to the modulator, causing a loss in the resonator, and the creation of a powerful pulse for a fraction of a second.
Such pulses output produced by active q-switching can be up to many megawatts for a billionth of a second, which is sufficient to create powerful photo-acoustic waves that offer a second method of fracturing tattoo ink.
Lower-quality tattoo removal lasers use passive q-switching, which produces repetitive shots of dramatically lower pulse energies. In these systems, a saturable absorber replaces the active modulator to control pulsing. This cheap and unsophisticated technique can be equated with using a dozen BB guns against a tank versus a bazooka. Without powerful pulses, tattoo ink cannot be removed, and practitioners will be able to offer nothing but ineffective treatments beyond the first or second session.
Even, Flat-Top Beam
Astanza tattoo removal lasers produce a beam with attractive flat top beam characteristics. This allows for uniform power distribution across the diameter of the laser beam, and avoids the micro-spikes and micro-nadirs in Gaussian irradiance distributions. The homogenous beam profile of Astanza’s Duality laser allows better clearance of resistant tattoos and less undesirable side effects in patients.
User-Friendly Touch Screen
Busy practices appreciate the easy-input touch screen on the Duality. The key variables you’ll adjust (wavelength, fluence, spot size, and repetition rate) can be changed in seconds through the interface that is clear for new users yet versatile for experienced practitioners.
Fast Warm-Up
Many experienced users of tattoo removal laser systems are all-too familiar with devices that take 5 to 20 minutes to “warm up” when you turn them on. Others take 2 or 3 minutes to get into “ready” mode. There’s a better way, and Astanza has incorporated technology into our systems that allows the Duality to be ready to treat a patient in less than 45 seconds from plugging the system into the wall. If already turned on, once a few settings are selected, turning the laser from standby to ready takes only a few seconds!
Articulated Arm for Pulse Delivery
An articulated arm is a preferred means of sealed beam delivery for applications like tattoo removal where precision is required. Counter-balanced and allowing full freedom of movement of the hand piece, articulated arms allow practitioners to comfortably and effectively deliver laser energy to the patient’s tattoo through an entire day.