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A Wrist for Needle-Sized Surgical Robots.

Peter A York1, Philip J Swaney2, Hunter B Gilbert2

  • 1Department of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA USA.

IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation : ICRA : [Proceedings]. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation
|September 26, 2015
PubMed
Summary

Surgeons can now navigate tight spaces with a new needle-sized robotic wrist. This inexpensive design, made from nitinol, enhances surgical tool dexterity for better tissue manipulation and visualization.

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Area of Science:

  • Medical Devices
  • Robotics
  • Materials Science

Background:

  • Minimally invasive surgical tools like those used in arthroscopy and otolaryngology require enhanced dexterity.
  • Current needle-sized instruments often lack the ability to navigate sharp corners for tissue manipulation or visualization.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To present a novel needle-sized wrist design for surgical tools.
  • To enable instruments to navigate sharp corners and improve tissue interaction.

Main Methods:

  • Designed a needle-sized wrist using a nitinol tube with asymmetric cutouts, actuated by a tendon.
  • Developed kinematic and static models to analyze design parameters and material nonlinearities.
  • Fabricated and tested a 1.16 mm diameter prototype.

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Main Results:

  • The developed wrist design successfully demonstrated the ability to navigate sharp corners.
  • Experimental results validated the derived kinematic and static models.
  • The design proved to be inexpensive and straightforward to manufacture.

Conclusions:

  • The needle-sized wrist design offers a significant advancement in surgical tool capabilities.
  • The developed models provide a foundation for optimizing future iterations of this technology.
  • This innovation has the potential to enhance surgical precision and outcomes in various fields.