Numerical simulation of thermal damage to living biological tissues induced by laser irradiation based on a generalized dual phase lag model

A generalized dual phase lag (DPL) bioheat model based on the nonequilibrium heat transfer in living biological tissues is applied to investigate thermal damage induced by laser irradiation. Comparisons of the temperature responses and thermal damages between the generalized and classical DPL bioheat model, derived from the constitutive DPL model and Pennes bioheat equation, are carried out in this study. It is shown that the generalized DPL model could predict significantly different temperature and thermal damage from the classical DPL model and Pennes bioheat conduction model. The generalized DPL equation can reduce to the classical Pennes heat conduction equation only when the phase lag times of temperature gradient (τ _T) and heat flux vector (τ _q) are both zero. The effects of laser parameters such as laser exposure time, laser irradiance, and coupling factor on the thermal damage are also studied.