CRII:SCH:Human-in-the-loop Design and Control of Handheld Robotic Instruments for Laparoscopic Surgery

高质量、负担得起的外科护理应该广泛提供，但可获得性往往主要取决于环境因素。例如，在偏远环境中，包括农村医院、前线和太空飞行中，可能不存在昂贵设备和专业外科医生所需的基础设施。虽然对大型机器人辅助微创手术系统的开发进行了大量研究，但商业系统和训练有素的外科医生既昂贵又资源有限。该项目的重点是开发低成本的手持机器人设备，将直接人工操作的优势与机器人的精度和灵活性结合起来。这些手持式机器人将在医疗领域产生广泛的影响，通过改善健康，福祉和护理标准，为缺乏服务的病人。此外，通过本研究发现的人在环设计和控制的基本原则将有助于指导医疗保健、制造业和国防等其他领域的新设备的创建。该项目旨在通过外展计划、公共实验室参观、开发新的实践课程以及对代表性不足的学生的指导来扩大工程学的参与。为了制造手持机器人设备，该项目将采取以人为本的方法，通过三个主要技术组件进行设计和控制。首先，将开发一个包含人手动力学的手持设备模型，以及手部和手臂中各种肌肉群的疲劳模型。这些模型将有助于设备设计。其次，将评估不同策略的效率和准确性，包括操纵乐器，以及将手的运动映射到乐器的运动。第三，柔性应变传感器将用于测量任务关键力信息，然后使用方向提示形式的触觉反馈显示给操作员。将测量最佳反馈参数，以及触觉反馈在提高任务性能方面的有效性。通过开发以人为本的设计方法，这项工作将扩展我们对远程机器人以外的机器人类人机交互的理解，并可以为创建除手术和医疗保健之外的应用新机器人提供指导原则。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

High-quality, affordable surgical care should be widely available, yet availability often depends largely on environmental factors. For example, the infrastructure for expensive equipment and expert surgeons may not exist in remote environments, including rural hospitals, battlefronts and space flights. While there has been significant research into the development of large-scale robot- assisted minimally invasive surgical systems, commercial systems and trained surgeons are both expensive as well as limited resources. This project focuses on developing lower-cost, handheld robotic devices that combine the strengths of direct human-operators with the precision and dexterity of robots. These handheld robots will have broad impact in the medical field, by improving the health, well-being, and standard of care for underserved patients. In addition, the fundamental principles of human-in-the-loop design and control discovered through this research will help guide the creation of new devices in other areas of healthcare, manufacturing, and defense. This project aims to broaden participation in engineering through outreach programs, public lab tours, the development of a new hands-on course, and the mentoring of underrepresented students.In order to create handheld robotic devices, this project will take a human-focused approach to design and control through three main technical components. First, a model of the handheld device that incorporates the dynamics of the human hand, along with fatigue models for various muscle groups in the hands and arms will be developed. These models will help inform the device design. Second, the efficiency and accuracy of different strategies for both steering the instrument, as well as for mapping hand movement to instrument movement, will be evaluated. Third, flexible strain sensors will be incorporated for measuring task-critical force information that will then be displayed to the operator using haptic feedback in the form of directional cues. The optimal feedback parameters, along with the effectiveness of haptic feedback in improving task performance, will be measured. By developing a human-focused design approach, this work will expand our understanding of human-robot interactions for classes of robots beyond telerobots and can provide guiding principles for creating new robots with applications beyond surgery and healthcare.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.