A surgical robot in space - finally

"January 30, 2024 — Virtual Incision Corporation, the developer of the MIRA Surgical System (MIRA), today announced that spaceMIRA is currently in transit to the International Space Station. The device is aboard a Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo spacecraft carried by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The 2024 technology demonstration mission is driven by a grant awarded from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to the University of Nebraska through the Established Program to Competitive Research (EPSCoR) program.  

Testing with spaceMIRA on the International Space Station will assess the impact of zero gravity when performing simulated surgical tasks. During a portion of the experiment, a surgeon operator at Virtual Incision’s headquarters in Lincoln, Nebraska will utilize remote-controlled technology to direct the movements of the robot."

"The robot surgeon is part of NASA’s Northrop Grumman 20th Commercial Resupply Mission to the ISS,  on board a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The Cygnus spacecraft is packed with more than 8,200 pounds of supplies, including a tiny, two-pound robot known as MIRA (Miniaturized In-vivo Robotic Assistant) that allows doctors to perform surgeries remotely. Or in this case, when the patient is hundreds of miles away while floating in Earth orbit.

MIRA, developed by medical startup Virtual Incision, performed its first surgery in August 2021, assisting in a right hemicolectomy procedure by cutting a single incision on a patient. Now the mechanical surgeon is heading to low Earth orbit where it will be tested so that it can perhaps one day be able to perform surgeries on astronauts in space.

“Working with NASA aboard the space station will test how MIRA can make surgery accessible in even the most faraway places,” John Murphy, CEO of Virtual Incision, said in a statement. Thanks to a 2022 NASA grant awarded to the company, MIRA will operate inside a microwave-oven-sized experiment locker on board the ISS and perform activities that simulate those used in surgery like cutting through stretched rubber bands (an alternative to human tissue) and pushing metal rings along a wire.

The robot surgeon is equipped with two controllable arms that can hold tools like a pair of scissors. As it stands today, the cyborg arm can’t operate on its own, but rather through the help of a real-life human surgeon that can communicate with it. The company is working on making its mechanical doctor more autonomous so that it can perform procedures on its own." 

 Source: Gizmodo, TS2