Quiz #4

Solution for our last, Quiz#3: Acrobot! Hope you knew it... Here goes our next quiz: which system can be seen above? You can submit your answers to surgrob.blog at gmail.com until June 15.

Joint EU CIS and Surgical Robotics Workshop

Good news! The various CIS related projects joined forces for a united workshop. One event for all, where you should also participate! Call for the 3rd Joint Workshop on New Technologies for Computer/Robot Assisted Surgery, to be held 11-13. September 2013, Verona.

"This workshop seeks to give a clear view on the status and recent trends of abovementioned assistive surgical robotic technologies and aims to propose concrete measures to achieve a critical mass in research and innovation in this field. In fact, regardless of its popularity, the share of European technology used in clinical practice remains disproportionally small, with limited signs of improvement on the horizon. The workshop will continue the discussion started at ERF in Lyon and at ICRA in Karlsruhe and will attempt to identify the steps necessary to stimulate cooperation among the projects in robotic surgery and the best approach to take advantage of the supposed attention of Horizon2020 to innovation.
We call for contributions summarizing the state-of-the-art or introducing promising trends in robot-assisted surgery, both from scientific as clinical perspective; contributions discussing the relevance, challenges and impediments that are faced by surgical robotic and assistive technology developers when considering the introduction of their technology into the surgical theatre as well as for visionary works that provide arguments to brake with the current status-quo."
Specific topics of interest are:

• registration, segmentation and modeling;
• motion compensation and active guidance;
• human-robot collaboration and shared control;
• workflow analysis and episode segmentation;
• machine learning and cognitive surgical robotics;
• surgical skill assessment;
• usability and user-acceptance;
• surgical training;
• standardization and regulation;
• system integration;
• safety and dependability;
• synergies and clustering;
• visionary works and roadmaps.

For more information, visit the official website.

CIS news

• Da Vinci surgery found costly
• Robotic surgery warm-up improves surgical performance
• Intuitive flags a ‘Potential Issue’ with the da Vinci
• Robotic Surgical Simulator (RoSS)-based curriculum debuts successfully
• Dr. Vipul Patel on the future of robotic surgery
• Hansen to Showcase Sensei X Robotic Catheter System at HRS Annual Scientific Session
• Sony releases 3D endoscope camera for robotic applications
• Study suggests best to combine virtual reality, inanimate tasks and in vivo training
• Intuitive's and MIMIC's skill trainers for under 100K
• Interview with Jeff Berkley, founder and CEO of MIMIC Inc. 
• Article on ROSS

• Here comes the new edition of the famous Montpellier Summer University (see v2011)
• 3rd Joint Workshop on New Technologies for Computer/Robot Assisted Surgery in Verona
• Postdoc positions in robotic surgery at Children's Hospital Boston

• SonaCare releases HIFU lapar system
• Neural bridge bypasses site of spinal cord injury

 

Photo credit: Corbis

Titan updates

Titan continues the development of its single incision tool.
Latest updates are here.

Flickstop -- Raven II

The Raven II now shows up at various labs in the US and in Europe as well. 

Learn more about this beautiful piece of engineering here. You can get yours for a mere $300,000.

Image credit:CITRIS center

CIS news

A lot of tension around the da Vinci:

• Surgeons defending the robotic MIS procedures
• Investigation on possible da Vinci surgery nerve risk 
• Research on the effectiveness of da Vinci throat surgery
• Defending robotic prostate surgery on Fox News
• Robotic surgery makes kidney donation less invasive
• Robot under FDA scrutiny over reports of freak accidents and deaths 
• New round of Intuitive's research grants

• Robot Accessory System for Patient positioning
• Surgical robotics market forecasted to reach $1,697.5 million by 2018
• CAVA Robotics is making business on da Vinci economics
• KUKA is getting more and more involved in medical robotics. 
• Johns Hopkins researchers develop swarms of tiny surgical robots
• Laser ablation surgery for epilepsy  
• Robotic  percutaneous coronary interventions : Is it worth the cost?
• New report on global market for medical robotic systems
• Meet your next surgeon: Dr. Robot
• Frog-like robot will help surgeons
• Investment priorities may be changing in MIS
• ABC news: robot surgery alert

• NeuroBlate approved for MRI-guided neurosurgical laser ablation
• Olympus introduces articulating HD 3D endoscope
• A wiring diagram of the brain
• Brain-to-Brain interface allows a human to wag a rat’s tail
• Postdoc opening at The University of Chicago in medical robotics

New add-on tactile feedback device for telerobotic sysems

We have reported before the efforts of the Cambridge Research group to create a low-cost, yet useful tactile feedback device for da Vinci-type surgeries. Recently, they have demonstrated the capabilities of the system with half-blinded object manipulation. Arguable, the sense of touch can add a lot of delicacy to the grabbing motions, but never forget the importance to provide extended/augmented vision at first. (Nevertheless, the fundamental issue of tactile information recording, i.e., picking up real 6 DoF information along a 3D object has not been solved yet.)

The new new device is a great add-on to existing setups, with a claimed very short adaptation time, and features such as:"

• True, full-range tactile sensation
• no impact on dexterity
• direct or derived signalling
• lightweight and cos effective
• complimentary to vibro-tactile and force-feedback."

Read more about it in their press release. 

Demonstration of haptic-enhanced minimally invasive surgery techniques: