[Filligree]

At a guess, it might be possible to at least partially fix the damage afterwards, by scraping off the damaged cells.

I wouldn't call that "humane", and it is a guess; it might not work at all. Nothing to do with war is 'humane', though.

[wnkrshm]

You're right, my choice of words was poor there, I didn't want to imply that there are any humane weapons or ways to wage war.

I think what I was trying to say is that if I could choose the wavelength to hit my eye, I'd pick extreme UV.