Jan 28 2011
Robo-boffins team at the Bio Robotics Lab of Washington University, are working on improving robot-assisted surgeries by including Vole's hands free technology. They are researching on including force feedback to offer increased sensitivity to surgeons while carrying out robotic procedures.
Howard Chizeck, Professor of Electrical Engineering, University of Washington, has stated that presently the surgeon does not have sense of touch during robotic procedures. He mentioned that they have decided to deploy sensitivity to the surgeon during the robot-assisted surgery. He added a force field will be generated around the organ. If the surgeon got very close to the organ, he would hit the force field, which will protect the organ.
In order to include sense of touch, the team requires a group of surgical devices that are remotely controlled, tubes containing camera systems and superior joysticks. The future equipment is expensive and the surgeon depends on small video displays to ensure major organs are not cut.
The researchers believe that in future this technology can be used in battlegrounds and catastrophe relief settings.
Source: http://brl.ee.washington.edu