Advanced Surgical Robotics and Intelligent Control Lab
ANSUR LAB
Handheld Microsurgical Robot
We aim to develop a multi-functional handheld surgical robot that can effectively treat brain tumors with phototheranosis-nano drugs, based on the precise targeting technology. This technology is a new interventional surgical robot system to accomplish 'maximum safe removal surgery' in intractable brain tumors.
Research
EKF based Precise Sensor Fusion Tumor SLAM
Real-Time Pattened PDD & PDT
Force Control of Handheld Micro-surgery Robot
핸드헬드 미세 수술 로봇의 힘 제어
To effectively remove a brain tumor, a surgeon must use a handheld surgical robot equipped with a contact camera, bringing it to the surgical site and performing image-based intelligent control. To acquire enhanced images through the camera without causing injury to soft and delicate areas like brain tissue, force control capable of interacting with the environment is essential.
The above demos have implemented force control using Admittance Control by attaching an F/T sensor to the end-effector of the handheld microsurgical robot.
Active Tremor Cancellation of
Handheld Micro-surgery Robot
핸드헬드 미세 수술 로봇의 손 떨림 보상
Unlike traditional surgical robots, the handheld microsurgical robot floats in the air, controlled by the surgeon's hand. A fundamental problem when floating in the air is that the robot directly reflects hand tremors. To solve this, tremors occurring in the 6~14 Hz band must be eliminated, and the original signal occurring below 2 Hz should be utilized for control. Various filter algorithms are being applied to analyze and filter out the signals that include hand tremors, and active research is being conducted to effectively dampen these tremors and minimize time delay.
Control of the end-effector fixation of a handheld robot
In microsurgery, such as eye surgery, which requires high precision and a Remote Center of Motion (RCM) inside the eye, the surgical capabilities can be enhanced through a six-degree-of-freedom manipulator. The above demo uses an EM Tracker sensor capable of detecting six degrees of freedom to fix the end-effector in space. Utilizing this research can enable safer microsurgery.
In microsurgery requiring Remote Center of Motion (RCM), it's necessary to design a robust six-degree-of-freedom manipulator as external forces are likely to be applied near the RCM. The above demo shows a video confirming that even when a force of about 5.0N is applied to the RCM of a six-degree-of-freedom manipulator, it still performs sufficiently well.
Fiber Bundle Imaging
Analysis of Nerve Degeneration Using CNN
Previously, to assess tissue damage, it was necessary to cut and analyze the tissue. However, with our technology, it is possible to assess tissue damage in real-time without cutting. Additionally, by using mosaicking technology, we can expand the locally acquired images to a broader view.
Honeycomb Pattern Removal Using Convolution Neural Network (CNN)
Image quality improvement algorithm based on CNN
In images acquired through fiber optic bundles, noise similar to a honeycomb pattern, as seen in the image on the left, is present. This noise presents challenges in applying feature-based image processing algorithms. To overcome this, we have proposed an image quality improvement algorithm based on Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN). Our research enables real-time noise removal from images obtained through fiber optic bundles
Real-time mosaicking based on feature points
By using an image quality improvement algorithm based on CNN to remove honeycomb-shaped noise, it is possible to perform real-time mosaicking based on feature points. This can overcome the narrow Field of View (FOV), which is a limitation of fiber optic bundles.
Micron
An Intelligent Handheld Instrument
Micron is a handheld instrument that actively cancels hand tremor during microsurgery. Micron can also aid fine manipulation for handheld OCT imaging, patterned laser photocoagulation, and membrane peeling.