Biomedical applications of electric gas discharges

A survey of applications of electrically generated plasmas in health care is given. Gas discharges are common tools for surface processing in material science, and nowadays they raise much interest in the medical technology. A wide variety of plasmas facilitates many lands of surface treatment low-pressure coating of artificial implants, plasma sterilisation of medical equipment, coagulation and vaporisation of pathological tissue using atmospheric arc-like discharges. Special attention is given to non-thermal gas discharges generated under atmospheric pressure. Possibilities of refined tissue treatment using non-destructive atmospheric plasmas are discussed.