8 accepted papers
Humans tend to use more energy to walk compared to other limb-based locomotion animals. This higher energy usage is due to “heel strikes” and “negative work” during human gait. Passive walkers elevate this phenomenon by utilizing elastic joints that absorb/reuse some of the negative work. The object
In physical human-robot interaction (pHRI) enabled by admittance control, delay-induced oscillations arising from both the neuromuscular time-delays of the human and electromechanical delays of the robot can cause unsafe instability in the system. This study presents and evaluates rate-limiting as a…
The overarching goal of this work is to demonstrate the feasibility of using optical coherence tomography (OCT) to guide a robotic system to extract lens fragments from <i>ex vivo</i> pig eyes. A convolutional neural network (CNN) was developed to semantically segment four intraocular structures (le
A multi-degree-of-freedom (multi-DOF) exoskeleton relies on an array of sensors to communicate its state (e.g., positions/orientations) and operator-exoskeleton contact interactions (e.g., forces/torques) to its control system. Although sensor redundancy is common in biological systems to cope with
The International Space Station (ISS) serves as a research lab for a wide variety of experiments including some that study the biological effects of microgravity and spaceflight using the Rodent Habitat and Microgravity Science Glovebox (MSG). Astronauts train for onboard dissections of rodents foll…
Tissue manipulation is a frequently used fundamental subtask of any surgical procedures, and in some cases it may require the involvement of a surgeon's assistant. The complex dynamics of soft tissue as an unstructured environment is one of the main challenges in any attempt to automate the manipula…
In autonomous suturing with a surgical robot, needle shape, diameter, and path are critical parameters that directly affect suture depth and tissue trauma. This paper presents an optimization-based approach to specify these parameters. Given clinical suturing guidelines, a kinematic model of needle-…
Minimally Invasive Surgery (MIS) can reduce iatrogenic injury and decrease the possibility of surgical complications. This paper presents a novel flexible and bendable endoscopic device, “Roboscope”, which delivers two instruments, two miniature scanning fiber endoscopes, and a suction/irrigation po…