A JPL team works with doctors from Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai Medical Center to develop a tool for cleaning out clogged arteries without surgery. JPL excimer laser technology is evaluated as an alternative to balloon angioplasty for opening coronary arteries that are narrowed by plaque.

This development -- laser angioplasty -- becomes a fairly standard medical prodecure. From 1988 to 1998, approximately 14,000 heart patients are treated with excimer laser angioplasty.