High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The role of femtosecond lasers in cataract surgery is to assist or replace several aspects of the manual cataract surgery. These include the creation of the initial surgical incisions in the cornea, the creation of the capsulotomy, and the initial fragmenting (breaking up) of the lens. The femtosecond laser may also produce incisions within the peripheral cornea to aid the correction of pre-existing astigmatism. The preliminary results are promising.