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Updated: Jul 19, 2025

Design and Implementation of a Bespoke Robotic Manipulator for Extra-corporeal Ultrasound
Published on: January 7, 2019
Compound continuum manipulator for surgery: Efficient static-based kinematics
Jing Su1, Gang Zhang1,2, Hangxing Wei1
1School of Mechanical Engineering, Shandong University, Jinan, China.
Background:
The combination of various continuum manipulators is a potential solution to break the bottleneck of continuum manipulators. However, continuum manipulators dissatisfy the constant curvature assumption due to the influence of joints.
Methods:
In this paper, a mechanics-based kinematic model of the compound continuum manipulator is proposed, which indicates that the curvature is non-constant. The static model of the manipulator is established, and the relationship of the bending angles is obtained. An efficient static-based Inverse Kinematic Algorithm using Polynomial Curve (IKAPC) of the manipulator is proposed. The polynomial curve is used to fit the end trajectory of the first manipulator.
Results:
The simulation results show that the IKAPC is 354 times faster than the Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm. The experimental results show that the mechanics-based model improves the position accuracy by 3.75 times over the constant curvature method.
Conclusion:
This paper is critical for solving the inverse kinematics of the compound continuum manipulator.
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