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In this talk we will discuss the production and dynamics of microexplosions in transparent materials, focusing, in particular, on water as the transparent medium. Using pump-probe techniques, we measured the initial expansion of the plasma with unprecedented temporal resolution. We find that the initial expansion velocity reaches 90 km/s, the fastest expansion of a solid density material observed to date. Furthermore, we have followed the dynamics of a microexplosion from these initial stages to the collapse of the bubble. We will discuss the importance of certain features of these dynamics for surgical applications. We will also describe some acoustic measurements that indicate femtosecond pulses offer advantages over longer pulses for surgical applications. In particular, we find that femtosecond pulses produce more consistent breakdown at a lower energy compared to picosecond pulses. Finally we will discuss some preliminary investigations we made into using femtosecond laser induced microexplosions to cut beneath the surface of skin tissue.