Motion analysis and experimental study of a cable-driven soft surgical robot

A cable-driven soft robot manipulator is analyzed in this paper. The soft robot manipulator is made of silicon and driven by cables. To improve its flexibility and controllability, the soft robot manipulator is divided into two parts from the middle. Due to infinite degrees of freedom (DOF) and soft materials, the soft robot manipulator is more difficult to model and control. A kinematic model, which takes the two parts into consideration, is established to analyze the motion of the soft robot manipulator. This kinematic model is based on piecewise constant curve. Experiments about motion analysis have been conducted for many times with artificial heart and healthy swine. The experiments demonstrate that the two-part soft robot manipulator is controlled better than one-part and has the ability to reach almost every regions of the heart including the posterior left atrial wall (LAPw).