Article intro - Autonomous Applied US Robotics
Our recent article, Takacs et al. appeared in the proceedings of the 15th IEEE SoSE conference (virtually) held in Budapest last month, titled: "Autonomous Applied Robotics: Ultrasound-Based Robot-Assisted Needle Insertion System Concept and Development"
Abstract
"Ultrasound (US) is a popular imaging modality for image-guided minimally
invasive surgery (MIS), enabling the faster and more reliable execution
of numerous procedures, such as biopsy, electrode placement and vessel
cannulation. Blood vessel cannulation is a common, routine intervention,
e.g., for blood oxygen level testing. Yet, in particular cases, when
the vessel is located deep or veins less stable (with the loss of
subcutaneous tissue), it is hard to complete it without US assistance.
In this paper, we present a solution for US-guided, robot-assisted
needle insertion for vein cannulation. We developed an image-guided
system to aid needle insertion via active targeting and anatomy-relevant
positioning, together with safeguarding features, such as a
kinematically enforced Remote Center of Motion (RCM) mechanism. The
proposed system comprises a portable US transducer mounted on a KUKA
iiwa collaborative robot, a custom designed needle insertion mechanism
with adjacent controllers. The US and needle insertion mechanism are
attached to the robot through a 3D printed custom designed mounting part
with integrated force sensor. The robot arm is responsible for moving
the needle to target position with impedance control. The needle
insertion mechanism allows the manipulation of the needle along 3 axes.
The mechanism was designed for near-surface vein cannulation with an RCM
kinematic structure to avoid damage to the vein. The developed system
was tested with different types of gelatin phantoms. Vein deformation
and tissue motion was examined during US imaging. The control loop of
our system is supplemented with vein deformation tissue model and
US-based visual servoing."
Source: IEEE Xplore
Comments