Improving the performance of PC-based controllers for robot-assisted surgery

This paper describes a PC-based controller for robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery, capable of accurate execution of preoperative plans under X-ray monitoring. The prototype of a recently developed surgical robot is enhanced with a hybrid, position and compliance control algorithm enabling manual operation and obstacle detections. In an experimental procedure under development, the robot is used as the surgical instrument, moved initially by the surgeon under position accommodation control, and then under hybrid control tracing the planned trajectory. The surgical robot is a clean-room PUMA 260 manipulator interfaced to a personal computer replacing the VAL controller. The control cycle is reduced to 8 ms, thus significantly improving the original robot performance. Preliminary tests have shown good results under position and hybrid control, and the system readiness for more realistic experiments using biological samples