31 accepted papers
Continuum manipulators are frequently employed in endoluminal interventions, however, a lack of softness and dexterity in standard manipulators can risk trauma during navigation and limit reachable workspace. Magnetically actuated Soft Continuum Robots (MSCRs) offer enhanced miniaturization potentia
Magnetic manipulation has been adopted as a method of actuation in both wireless capsule endoscopy and soft-tethered endoscopy, with the goal of improving gastrointestinal procedures. However, by nature of magnetic manipulation, these endoscopes are typically limited to a maximum of five degrees of
Magnetic Soft Continuum Robots (MSCR) are used in a wide variety of surgical interventions, including neurological, pancreatic, and cardiovascular procedures. To function effectively, these MSCRs require complex programmable magnetisation. However, they often suffer from limited manoeuvrability and
Innovative robotic catheters that are soft, flexible, and controlled by magnets have the potential to revolutionize minimally invasive surgical procedures in critical areas such as the lungs, brain and pancreas, which currently pose significant safe access challenges using existing technology. These
Despite the increased interest in robotic systems designed for bronchoscopy, the influence of the bronchial tree dynamics remains relatively unexplored. To enable robotic solutions to perform successful autonomous navigations whilst minimizing contact with the internal anatomy, they must be capable
Drawing inspiration from natural growth and movement strategies, vine robots possess exceptional passive shape-forming abilities, enabling them to deform around obstacles. However, an intrinsic lack of active steering limits their capacity to control their growth trajectory. This letter considers th
Simulation represents a key aspect in the development of robot systems. The ability to simulate behavior of real-world robots provides an environment where robot designs can be developed and control systems optimized. Due to the use of external magnetic fields for actuation, magnetic soft robots can
Soft and flexible magnetic robots have gained significant attention in the past decade. These robots are fabricated using magnetically-active elastomers, are capable of large deformations, and are actuated remotely thus allowing for small robot size. This combination of properties is appealing to th
This letter discusses a novel static control approach applied to magnetic soft continuum robot (MSCR). Our aim is to demonstrate the control of a multi-magnet soft continuum robot (SCR) in 3D. The proposed controller, based on a simplified yet accurate model of the robot, has a high update rate and
The calibration of a vision-guided dual-arm robotic system, including the robot-robot and hand-eye calibration, requires the tracked positions of markers in different postures. However, in many cases, using markers to calibrate is impractical. Only some markerless features can be obtained rather tha…
Fully soft continuum magnetic (FSCMs) microrobots with highly deformable structures have emerged as a potential solution to robotically controlled endovascular interventions. The microrobot's structure is made of magneto-responsive material, which offers full body control under a magnetic field inst
Localization of magnetically actuated medical robots is essential for accurate actuation, closed loop control and delivery of functionality. Despite extensive progress in the use of magnetic field and inertial measurements for pose estimation, these have been either under single external permanent m
Flexible catheters are used in a wide variety of surgical interventions including neurological, pancreatic and cardiovascular. In many cases a lack of dexterity and miniaturization along with excessive stiffness results in large regions of the anatomy being deemed inaccessible. Soft continuum robots
Soft continuum robots have the potential to revolutionize minimally invasive surgery. The challenges for such robots are ubiquitous; functioning within sensitive, unstructured and convoluted environments which are inconsistent between patients. As such, there exists an open design problem for robots
In this letter, we describe a novel framework for planning and executing semi-autonomous tissue retraction in minimally invasive robotic surgery. The approach is aimed at removing tissue flaps or connective tissue from the surgical area autonomously, thus exposing the underlying anatomical structure
Magnetically actuated soft robots have recently been identified for application in medicine, due to their potential to perform minimally invasive exploration of human cavities. Magnetic solutions permit further miniaturization when compared to other actuation techniques, without loss in functionalit…
Continuum manipulators are flexible robots which undergo continuous deformation as they are actuated. To describe the elastic deformation of such robots, kinematic models have been developed and successfully applied to a large variety of designs and to various levels of constitutive stiffness. Indep
Gastric cancer is the third leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide, with most new cases occurring in low and middle income countries, where access to screening programs is hindered by the high cost of conventional endoscopy. The waterjet-actuated HydroJet endoscopic platform was developed as a low
In the present work we discuss a novel dynamic control approach for magnetically actuated robots, by proposing an <i>adaptive control</i> technique, robust towards parametric uncertainties and unknown bounded disturbances. The former generally arise due to partial knowledge of the robots' dynamic pa
In this paper, explicit model predictive control is applied in conjunction with nonlinear optimisation to a magnetically actuated flexible endoscope for the first time. The approach is aimed at computing the motion of the external permanent magnet, given the desired forces and torques. The strategy
The present letter investigates a novel control approach for magnetically driven soft-tethered capsules for colonoscopy-a potentially painless approach for colon inspection. The focus of this work is on a class of devices composed of a magnetic capsule endoscope actuated by a single external permane
Traditional endoscopes consist of a flexible body and a steerable tip with therapeutic capability. Although prior endoscopes have relied on operator pushing for actuation, recent robotic concepts have relied on the application of a tip force for guidance. In such case, the body of the endoscope can
The potential of multi-degrees-of-freedom (DOFs) local magnetic actuation (LMA) has been established in recent years for dexterous minimally invasive surgical manipulations. Nonetheless, having multiple magnetic based units, one for each DOF, within a close vicinity to each other leads to magnetic f
This letter tackles the problem of independent control of multiple degrees of freedom (DoF) systems based on local magnetic actuation (LMA). This is achieved by means of a modular disturbance rejection scheme, with the aim of enhancing the range of use of multiple-DoF LMAs in dexterous surgical mani
Retroflexion during colonoscopy is typically only practiced in the wider proximal and distal ends of the large intestine owing to the stiff nature of the colonoscope. This inability to examine the proximal side of the majority of colon folds contributes to today's suboptimal colorectal cancer detect
Manual palpation is commonly used to localize tumors and other features buried deep inside organs during open surgery. This approach is not feasible in minimally invasive or robotic surgery, as the contact with the tissue is mediated by instruments. To address this problem, we propose a soft robotic…
Magnetic field gradients have repeatedly been shown to be the most feasible mechanism for gastrointestinal capsule endoscope actuation. An inverse quartic magnetic force varia- tion with distance results in large force gradients induced by small movements of a driving magnet; this necessitates robot…
In this letter, we present for the first time a magnetic anchoring-actuation link with an auto-flip feature. This orthogonal magnetic arrangement relies on the placement of two permanent magnets such that their magnetic moments are respectfully orthogonal. Though the arrangement may have many applic
In this paper, we demonstrate velocity-level closed-loop control of a tethered magnetic capsule endoscope that is actuated via serial manipulator with a permanent magnet at its end-effector. Closed-loop control (2 degrees-of-freedom in position, and 2 in orientation) is made possible with the use of…
Independent mobility is an important aspect of an individual's life and must sometimes be augmented by use of an assistive device such as a wheeled walker or cane following a fall, injury, or functional decline. Physical therapists perform functional gait assessments to gauge the probability of an i…
Minimally invasive robotic surgery techniques are becoming popular thanks to their enhanced patient benefits, including shorter recovery time, better cosmetic results and reduced discomforts. Less invasive procedures would be achieved with the use of Medical Capsule Robots (MCRs). These devices are…