High pass filters and dust&scratches

I'd like to know exactly what is happening when I apply the high pass filter and dust&scratches noise reduction to an image. I'm a scientist and my data comes in image form, so I'd like to know the technical details of what I'm doing to the images (and thus my data!).

Are the algorithms/functions available to look at anywhere?

Thanks.
S.rifkin

It would surprise me if they were, in anything less than a very general way. This would be very important proprietary information to Adobe, and not something they would want public.