Biomedical Engineering and Bioengineering Commons^™

Surgical Navigation In Image-Guided Transoral Robotic Surgery, Yuan Shi

Dartmouth College Ph.D Dissertations

Transoral robotic surgery (TORS) is a minimally invasive approach in treating head and neck cancers and has demonstrated improved surgical outcomes with reduced morbidity when compared to traditional open surgery. However, the lack of haptic feedback makes it more difficult to assess the tumor extent and locate critical structures (e.g., artery and nerves). In standard-of-care TORS, preoperative imaging is used as guidance; however, it becomes inaccurate intraoperatively: the patient’s neck is hyper-extended, surgical instruments are introduced, and soft tissues deform significantly. As a result, the surgeon is required to mentally predict intraoperative deformation, which can lead to bleeding complications and …

Dynamic Image Processing For Guidance Of Off-Pump Beating Heart Mitral Valve Repair, Feng Li

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Compared to conventional open heart procedures, minimally invasive off-pump beating heart mitral valve repair aims to deliver equivalent treatment for mitral regurgitation with reduced trauma and side effects. However, minimally invasive approaches are often limited by the lack of a direct view to surgical targets and/or tools, a challenge that is compounded by potential movement of the target during the cardiac cycle. For this reason, sophisticated image guidance systems are required in achieving procedural efficiency and therapeutic success. The development of such guidance systems is associated with many challenges. For example, the system should be able to provide high quality …

Techniques For Sensor-Integrated Robotic Systems: Raman Spectra Analysis, Image Guidance, And Kinematic Calibration, Luke Anthony Reisner

Wayne State University Dissertations

Robotics and sensor technology have made impressive advancements over the years. There are now robotic systems that help perform surgeries or explore the surface of Mars, and there are sensors that detect trace amounts of explosives or identify diseased human tissue. The most powerful systems integrate robots and sensors, which are natural complements to each other. Sensors can provide information that might otherwise be unavailable due to indirect robotic manipulation (e.g., images of the target environment), and robots can provide suitably precise positioning of an analytical sensor.

To have an effective sensor-integrated robotic system, multiple capabilities are needed in the …