Patent ID: 7880116

Claim:
A laser head adapted to irradiate an interaction region of an inhabitable structure with laser light to remove material from the structure, the laser head comprising: a housing; a connector coupled to the housing and optically coupled to a laser generator, the connector adapted to transmit laser light from the laser generator; at least one optical element contained in the housing and optically coupled to the connector, the optical element adapted to receive laser light from the connector; and a containment plenum coupled to the housing, the containment plenum optically coupled to the optical element to receive the laser light from the optical element, the containment plenum adapted to confine the material and remove the material from the interaction region resulting from irradiating the structure with the laser light, wherein the containment plenum is cooled by a cooling medium flowing through a coolant conduit of the containment plenum, the coolant conduit fluidly coupled to a source of the cooling medium that is spaced from the containment plenum.