Surgical Manipulator Arm Control for Precomputed Collision Avoidance
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing surgical systems with multiple manipulator arms face interference issues during medical procedures, particularly when inserting instruments between ribs, where optimizing opening positions is challenging, and movement speed limitations are necessary to prevent collisions, leading to potential inaccuracies in medical treatment.
Innovation Solution
A method for controlling surgical systems that involves setting constraint points and creating lattice models to simulate the movement of surgical instruments, identifying combinations of lattice points that cause interference, and executing interference prevention processing to prevent collisions without complex calculations during medical procedures.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If movement speeds of manipulator arms are limited to prevent interference, then collision prevention is improved, but surgical instruments cannot follow operator commands accurately and treatment time increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary simulation to predict interference before actual surgical operations. By calculating potential interference in advance based on manipulator arm positions and movement trajectories, the control device can prevent collisions without limiting movement speeds during actual surgery, thus maintaining both safety and surgical efficiency
2Reliability
If opening positions are optimized by simulation to prevent interference, then manipulator arm collision is reduced, but opening positions may not be located at positions easy for operator to conduct treatment
Solution Approach 1:
The system provides real-time feedback to the operator when selected opening positions or manipulator positions may cause interference. The control device notifies the operator of potential interference issues, allowing the operator to adjust positions while maintaining ease of operation, rather than pre-determining fixed opening positions that may not be optimal for surgical access
3Measurement precision
If complex calculations are performed in real-time to detect interference, then interference detection accuracy is improved, but processing time increases and may affect surgical workflow
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs interference detection calculations in advance during the simulation phase, before actual surgical operations begin. By pre-calculating interference scenarios and storing results, the system avoids performing complex real-time calculations during surgery, thus maintaining high detection accuracy without adding processing delays to the surgical workflow
Data Source
AI summary
Simulated are postures each formed by a manipulator arm and a surgical instrument when a tip end portion of the surgical instrument is located at a three-dimensional position of each lattice point in a lattice model set so as to correspond to the manipulator arm, the surgical instrument being held by the manipulator arm. Extracted is such a combination of the lattice points in the lattice models that the postures interfere with each other. Data of the combination which causes the interference is stored in a storage portion. It is determined whether or not an operating command transferred to a control portion corresponds to the combination which causes the interference. When it is determined that the operating command corresponds to the combination which causes the interference, the control portion executes interference preventing processing.