A Contact Force Sensor Based on S-Shaped Beams and Optoelectronic Sensors for Flexible Manipulators for Minimally Invasive Surgery (MIS)
- Submitting institution
-
Royal College of Art(The)
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- Sareh5
- Type
- D - Journal article
- DOI
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10.1109/JSEN.2019.2945163
- Title of journal
- IEEE Sensors Journal
- Article number
- -
- First page
- 3487
- Volume
- 20
- Issue
- 7
- ISSN
- 1530-437X
- Open access status
- Compliant
- Month of publication
- -
- Year of publication
- 2019
- URL
-
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8854863
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
5
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- Flexible, highly articulated robotic tools can facilitate procedures in which the operator needs to access confined spaces. Particularly, in the context of robotic-assisted minimally invasive surgery, the application of such manipulation tools can be significantly beneficial in preventing unnecessary interactions with sensitive body organs thereby reducing patient’s recovery time. However, these systems usually lack tactile feedback and are not able to perceive and quantify the interactions between themselves and soft body organs which may result in damaging the organs due to unwanted excessive force applied. To this end, we introduced a contact force sensor based on 'dyadic-S-shaped' beams and optoelectronics. The strategic employment of custom sensor structure and the optoelectronic components meets our design objectives focused on the creation of a modular, low-cost, low-noise with large voltage variation, without the need for an amplifier, through a simple fabrication process for MIS. This work has facilitated setting up an international collaboration between three London universities (Royal College of Art, King’s College London and Queen Mary) with the US Army Laboratory in Virginia. The joint research has been continued since then towards further miniaturisation, improvements on materials to reduce hysteresis effects, and development of a business case for contact sensing in articulated tools and robots. The capacity of knowledge created as part of the collaboration gave rise to funding and development of a new successful project at Royal College of Art, called “ Topographies of Pain: a technology that assists people to articulate their symptoms when they are in pain, funded by MedTech SuperConnector, currently run in partnership with GSK Consumer Healthcare, and using the sensing approach developed by the paper. Our contact sensing technology as part of the more comprehensive Topographies of Pain project is very beneficial to our healthcare system and can enhance the effectiveness of medical treatments.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -
