Physical Background of SHR (Soprano XL)

Hair Removal Methods Laser hair removal
#1

Recently i read a statement that the soprano would not primarily affect “the melanin” (i.e. heat up the hair and its surrounding) but selectively destroy the hair growing cells by heating up their proteins.

I must admit that i have severe difficulties to see the physical background of the method, especially how these cells differ from the surrounding matrix in order to be selectively destroyed (and that with an 810 nm laser). The only publickation on the method itself i found was a 2-page paper on a “clinical study” which IMHO lacks every scientific standard. So my question: does someone know on publications telling details on the bio-physical background of the approach?

#2

It’s going to be difficult to find anything clinical, they usually do these things to say that they tested it and it didn’t hurt anyone and it could work.

The way i explain it here is the same way the guy that invented the approach said in a conference a few years ago that i took part in.

There is that absorption diagram which shows the levels of melanin and water and the curves of different laser types.
Now, think of it like trying to boil a bath tub full of water with 1 ray of sun light. How long will it take you to boil the water?
Now imagine the same bath tub but this time you put the bath tub outside in the sun where lots of sun rays will hit it. The water will boil in no time this way.

Now, the idea is that it’s going to take far less energy to achieve results using the 2nd method and therefore spare the patient the pain by giving same amount (if not more) of energy but splitting it over smaller shots.

#3

Putting a bathtub in the sun will never boil it to answer your question (otherwise all our lakes and oceans would have boiled away long, long ago). There might be some evaporation, but that’s about it. A “single” ray of sunshine (by this you mean one photon I suppose) will also never ever boil anything.

I am not challenging the concept of the laser itself (I know very little about it), but that analogy is super misleading. Unless you live on the planet Mercury or something.

#4

Strange explanation: it will always require the same amount of energy to heat up a given volume by some amount (in a closed system). You have the coice of applying it either with low intensity over long time or with high intensity over short time.

Actually this has been utilized in photoepilation with the eclipse device (the old IPL2-box) - there was a special handpiece permitting lower energy over longer time to treat dark skin. But the manufacturer did not claim doing something else than selectivily heating up melanin.

Despite of that this does not at all answer the key problem: what else if not melanin is to be heated selectively? What is the effect to selectively destroy certain types of cells and not the other types in immediate neighbourship?

Beate

#5

Beate is absolutely right. In a closed system, you can increase heat slowly to reach a given temperature (you can do this with any system in which the heat dissipates more slowly than it accumulates, I assume).

But with hair removal, the temperature HAS to eventually reach a critical point in order to destroy cells. Heating it up a few degrees and then letting it cool down completely before heating it up a few degrees and letting it cool again will only cause the temperature to oscillate between 98.6 degrees and maybe 100 degrees (for example). No matter how many times you do this, the cells will never reach the burning point (skin burns at 130 degrees so I will use that for my example). Without the ability to kill cells via heat (ie- burning), then how does it destroy the cells? I was always assuming that they didn’t let the skin cool down between pulses, that they raised the temperature cumulatively, which makes perfect sense. But I’ve heard recently that they DO let the skin cool down between each pass, and that the skin doesn’t even feel warm in some areas.

There HAS to be more to this machine than just heating the skin up a few degrees with each pass and then letting it cool, there has to be. Otherwise it’s the same as getting in a hot tub until your temperature goes up, then getting right back out, then getting in again, then out (which obviously doesn’t remove hair).

Again, not saying the device doesn’t work or anything. I just think some of the analogies used don’t make sense. I suspect they are trying to “dumb the concept down” for the consumer instead of giving the real science behind it.

#6

One interesting thing that I found with it is as you said it sounds like it has to constantly go over the area to gradually increase the heat. Watching YouTube videos though of treatment, they always seem to pass an area once or twice, then they remove the device wait a moment then do it again, or they pass it once or twice, then they just keep moving it over the area without firing pulses then do it again. So it seems as though there can be a delay in between pulses. If you watch the video on Alma’s website though, it doesn’t really show it as gradually heating it up. Like it does, but they describe it more as in the hair absorbs the heat and the surrounding cells, but then the head stays in the area and gradually builds up since the cells and skin cause it to remain trapped below the surface which seems to allow the slight delay in between passes…

#7

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8YSK9BNE8M better quality

#8

Chromaphores (sp) in the surrounding tissue is used as reservoirs to trap the heat in addition to the head being delivered directly from the hand piece. That’s what I was trying to say earlier lol.

#9

edo, thanks for the video. It appears that they do the passes quickly enough to not let the area cool down between pulses. They state that they heat the follicles to 113 degrees over multiple passes. If this is true, then that makes perfect sense, but I still don’t understand why you wouldn’t feel very intense heat as it cumulates, even with the cooling system they use.

Also, a better analogy would be slow roasting meat continuously (but turning the spit so that no one area is getting full heat for more than a second at a time), versus burning meat directly in the fire. This analogy makes more sense (to me as a consumer) than all the other misleading analogies I’ve heard about this machine.

#10

Well from experience with being treated with it, however it works cooling isn’t really a huge factor. What I mean is with my Apogee, they use very cold ultrasound gel, then cold air blowing on the skin for cooling. With the Soprano XL, they warm the ultrasound gel to keep it warm. There’s no cold air or anything blowing on you during treatment. The video shows it just in single pulse mode. They talk about the sapphire tip cooling which I think just means that the laser tip doesn’t retain heat, meaning it’s not like say a flat iron where you leave it on then unplug it and a few mins later it’s still hot. Using a cooling system seems counter productive though if it was blowing cold air for example, so I’m not really sure. Keep in mind the laser is targeting the dark pigment of the hair and the melanin in the hair, so I guess it’s more reasonable to think that it is possible to gradually heat the hair up and not feel pain since it is looking for the hair and trying to avoid the skin. I’m not sure!

#11

Sorry if my analogy didn’t make much sense, my general idea is to heat a place using a large area of absorption vs 1 single 10-18mm area every time.

edokid: the reason we heat the gel is just for comfort purposes, we know it’s uncomfortable to be treated with cold gel.
Most places (i think) that uses the Soprano also use another machine that blows cold air while being treated, we think it’s a little bit pointless since most of the time you won’t be feeling much anyway.

About the tip of the hand piece, it has water cooling built in such that when you don’t fire the pulses, the tip gets VERY cold very fast, it almost freezes in like 2-3 seconds, again that is only for comfort of the client.

The way you work with it though, you do passes over an area, usually at least 6 passes over the area, until you see the area starts to be a little bit pink and that is a good indication that you treated the area enough.

So in a way, the way it works is by gradually heating an area.

#12

Anyway there still needs to be an explanation on the selectivity of the process - which is crucial because we do not want to roast the entire skin.

My impression is that this process might simply be the analog of slow thermolysis in electrology.

BTW: here a link to a german distributor who claims that the skin is slowly heated up to only 45° Celsius - too low to destroy the tissue thermally (which requires 73° Celsius) http://www.laserwelt.com/produkte/soprano-xl.html
(with an advertising video in english). There ist some diffuse statement that the system works on the protein of the stem cells. (BTW: hair grows from specialized cells, not from stem cells…)

If this is really true we still have to find another physical effect, of course one that operates selectively on the germinative cells. This has been the aim of my initial question - and i consider it still open.

Beate

#13

I find it curious that Soprano claims to treat faster than other machines, yet you indicate that it requires at least 6 passes over the same area vs 1 pass for other machines.

#14

Ok, if there really was a physical effect in addition the well known on melanine, it might possibly lead to more efficiancy, e.g. less treatments for the same effect as the light sheer (in order to stick with the wavelength).

Please notice the was and the might possibly …

Beate

who more and more gets the impression of “too nice to be true”

#15

LAgirl, edokid sent me a link to a single armpit being treated (dunno if he posted it here or not) and it took over 3 whole minutes for that one tiny area. That would take ten seconds with a GentleLASE. There’s no way on earth Soprano XL is faster, unless the people in the video were doing it completely wrong or something.

#16

As far as i noticed the people in the video the people demonstrating the treatment covered the area very loosely and even left gaps of ttreatments. Ok, it ist advertizing, not technical advice.

#17

It not an advertising video that I am referring to. It was an actual full treatment in a clinic. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRqwm6-Tt7Y&feature=related

#18

Female full legs take about 40-50 min. Male back take about 25 min.
For a tiny place that takes little pulses it wouldn’t make much difference time wise compared to other machines.

6 passes take about 5-10 seconds, you need to run very fast with the hand piece otherwise you will burn the skin. It fires 10 pulses per second at 10 joules each so if you leave it on one spot for 1 second you will hit 100 joules, that’s not very pleasant.

#19

Please excuse. I followed the wrong link.

Beate

#20

I noticed that. If the person doing the passes fired more than once in the same spot, such as putting it on the skin pulling the trigger having it fire 10 times then start moving, or stopping and having it fire 10 times then letting go of the trigger, you definitely felt it. There were a couple times you’d for sure feel a short sting of pain if that happened. Very rare only few times and it’s not painful but you could definitely tell if it hit the same spot too many times in short succession!