On the piecewise-smooth dynamics of robot-cancer interactions at microscale

事实上，许多肠癌可能在最初的恶性转化发生后很快就扩散了，这可能是在疾病被诊断之前的几年。为了发生转移，恶性细胞必须获得侵入邻近毛细血管或毛细血管的能力，然后通过循环扩散到身体的其他部位。然后，这些细胞可以生长并形成其他肿瘤，这可能在调查扫描中很明显。然而，早期转移可能太小，无法通过目前的方式可靠地检测到，并且对于大多数癌症，没有可用的血液检测来检测循环中的恶性细胞。该项目旨在开发新的数学技术，用于分析微型机器人的传感能力，以帮助检测胃肠道循环中难以可视化的早期转移。

Many bowel cancers may, in fact, spread very soon after the original malignant transformation has occurred, which could be some years before the disease is diagnosed. For metastases to occur, malignant cells must acquire the ability to invade adjacent capillaries or lymphatics and then spread via the circulation to other parts of the body. These cells can then grow and form other tumours, which may be readily apparent on investigative scans. However, early metastases may be too small to be reliably detected by current modalities, and, for most cancers, there is no available blood test to detect malignant cells within the circulation. This project seeks to develop novel mathematical techniques for analysing the sensing capability of micro-robots to aid the detection of hard-to-visualise early metastases in the gastrointestinal circulation.