Development of remote microsurgery robot and new surgical procedure for deep and narrow space

Abstract

We developed both new operation procedure and new robot system for remote micro surgery at deep and narrow space of human body. This system allows us to operate a difficult microsurgery that conventional method cannot be achieved. Our system consists of flexible stem and slave micro manipulators which can enter deep site such as brain through narrow channel. The macro motion of master manipulator can be converted into miniature motion of the slave microsurgery manipulator with five degrees of freedom in 3 mm diameter. This system has been taking advantage of flexible catheter and decoupled micro manipulator invented by Ikuta. Total performance was verified by animal experiment.