Page 20 - Mike's published articles

2 MURPHY
Fig.1. Glassslidewithpittingmarksunderlightmicroscopewithmagnificationsat⇥60(a),andat ⇥47 (b). The dark dots in (a) are tattoo ink fragments. The pits were typically found to be between <0.1 and 1 mm in size.
that some ink aggregates are perforating vessels following an explosive reaction within the deeper ink fragment surfaces. However, following a number of treatments during the original study [19] the author noticed “pitting” on some of the glass slides (Fig. 1). The purpose of this subsequent study was to determine the origin and contents of these pits
in the slides used in the original study.
The pits were originally assumed to be due to physical
stresses in the glass caused by the very high optical irradiances at 1064 nm (typically 3.5–5.1 J/cm2 in an 8 ns pulsewidth yielding an irradiance range of 440–640 MW/cm2) impinging
upon the slide. This was found not to be the case, however, when the slides were exposed to the same irradiances with the slides positioned above non-tattooed skin or plain white paper. In addition, the pitting only occurred on the surfaces which were in contact with tattooed skin.
None of the embedded ink aggregates within the glass slide were visible to the unaided eye. Given that the resolution of the human eye is around 40–50mm, this indicates an upper limit on the size of the aggregates embedded within the glass. Further evidence of the origins of these pits can be clearly seen in Figure 2 where
Fig. 2. The glass slide exhibits an “image” of the original professional tattoo following treatment using the “glass slide technique.” The dark particles on this slide were clearly on its surface as they were easily washed off. These particles had not penetrated into the glass. (Photographs used with the kind permission of Lesley Murphy).