User-centered design of a dynamic-autonomy remote interaction concept for manipulation-capable robots to assist elderly people in the home

In this article, we describe the development of a human-robot interaction concept for service robots to assist elderly people in the home with physical tasks. Our approach is based on the insight that robots are not yet able to handle all tasks autonomously with sufficient reliability in the complex and heterogeneous environments of private homes. We therefore employ remote human operators to assist on tasks a robot cannot handle completely autonomously. Our development methodology was user-centric and iterative, with six user studies carried out at various stages involving a total of 241 participants. The concept is under implementation on the Care-O-bot 3 robotic platform. The main contributions of this article are (1) the results of a survey in form of a ranking of the demands of elderly people and informal caregivers for a range of 25 robot services, (2) the results of an ethnography investigating the suitability of emergency teleassistance and telemedical centers for incorporating robotic teleassistance, and (3) a user-validated human-robot interaction concept with three user roles and corresponding three user interfaces designed as a solution to the problem of engineering reliable service robots for home environments

Recent trends in automating robotic surgery

Eversince computer technology entered the operating room (OR), surgery has gone through one of the greatest changes in the history of medicine, and now we are foreseeing the age of the digital OR. The range of the novel applications spans from intra-operative navigation to the development of autonomous suturing tools. More recently, after 20 years of experience with pre-programmed, image-guided and teleoperational surgical robots, a new trend is emerging: to create autonomous, or partially autonomous surgical robots. These advanced systems are intended to fit into the surgical workflow, and to help the surgeon in the least intrusive way possible. It is only the recent development of surgical-digital applications which can overcome a the barrier of the cognitive load on surgeons, to become able to completely control of the operating field. Three major trends have been identified in current products and advanced research prototypes: 1) aiming to improve camera handling 2) Sub-task automation 3) complete automation

Virtobot 2.0: the future of automated surface documentation and CT-guided needle placement in forensic medicine

In this paper we present the second prototype of a robotic system to be used in forensic medicine. The system is capable of performing automated surface documentation using photogrammetry, optical surface scanning and image-guided, post-mortem needle placement for tissue sampling, liquid sampling, or the placement of guide wires. The upgraded system includes workflow optimizations, an automatic tool-change mechanism, a new software module for trajectory planning and a fully automatic computed tomography-data-set registration algorithm. We tested the placement accuracy of the system by using a needle phantom with radiopaque markers as targets. The system is routinely used for surface documentation and resulted in 24 surface documentations over the course of 11months. We performed accuracy tests for needle placement using a biopsy phantom, and the Virtobot placed introducer needles with an accuracy of 1.4mm (±0.9mm). The second prototype of the Virtobot system is an upgrade of the first prototype but mainly focuses on streamlining the workflow and increasing the level of automation and also has an easier user interface. These upgrades make the Virtobot a potentially valuable tool for case documentation in a scalpel-free setting that uses purely imaging techniques and minimally invasive procedures and is the next step toward the future of virtual autopsy

Realistic 3D printed imaging tumor phantoms for validation of image processing algorithms

Medical imaging phantoms are widely used for validation and verification of imaging systems and algorithms in surgical guidance and radiation oncology procedures. Especially, for the performance evaluation of new algorithms in the field of medical imaging, manufactured phantoms need to replicate specific properties of the human body, e.g., tissue morphology and radiological properties. Additive manufacturing (AM) technology provides an inexpensive opportunity for accurate anatomical replication with customization capabilities. In this study, we proposed a simple and cheap protocol to manufacture realistic tumor phantoms based on the filament 3D printing technology. Tumor phantoms with both homogenous and heterogenous radiodensity were fabricated. The radiodensity similarity between the printed tumor models and real tumor data from CT images of lung cancer patients was evaluated. Additionally, it was investigated whether a heterogeneity in the 3D printed tumor phantoms as observed in the tumor patient data had an influence on the validation of image registration algorithms. A density range between -217 to 226 HUs was achieved for 3D printed phantoms; this range of radiation attenuation is also observed in the human lung tumor tissue. The resulted HU range could serve as a lookup-table for researchers and phantom manufactures to create realistic CT tumor phantoms with the desired range of radiodensities. The 3D printed tumor phantoms also precisely replicated real lung tumor patient data regarding morphology and could also include life-like heterogeneity of the radiodensity inside the tumor models. An influence of the heterogeneity on accuracy and robustness of the image registration algorithms was not found

Technical and Functional Validation of a Teleoperated Multirobots Platform for Minimally Invasive Surgery

Nowadays Robotic assisted Minimally Invasive Surgeries (R-MIS) are the elective procedures for treating highly accurate and scarcely invasive pathologies, thanks to their abil- ity to empower surgeons\u2019 dexterity and skills. The research on new Multi-Robots Surgery (MRS) platform is cardinal to the development of a new SARAS surgical robotic platform, which aims at carrying out autonomously the assistants tasks during R- MIS procedures. In this work, we will present the SARAS MRS platform validation protocol, framed in order to assess: (i) its technical performances in purely dexterity exercises, and (ii) its functional performances. The results obtained show a prototype able to put the users in the condition of accomplishing the tasks requested (both dexterity- and surgical-related), even with rea- sonably lower performances respect to the industrial standard. The main aspects on which further improvements are needed result to be the stability of the end effectors, the depth per- ception and the vision systems, to be enriched with dedicated virtual fixtures. The SARAS\u2019 aim is to reduce the main surgeon\u2019s workload through the automation of assistive tasks which would benefit both surgeons and patients by facilitating the surgery and reducing the operation time