Biomechanical Modeling and Surgical Planning	Robotic Surgery	Robotic Hands	Rehabilitation Robotics	Haptics

Biomechanical Modeling and Surgical Planning

Heart valve repair is technically difficult; providing the surgeon with an anatomically and biomechanically accurate computer model of a particular patient's valve could enable preoperative surgical planning and potentially improve surgical outcome. We are developing this technology through close collaboration with cardiac surgeons at Children's Hospital Boston. We have developed methods for automatically segmenting heart valve structures in real-time 3d ultrasound images, and we can simulate the ability of valves to close properly using fast & biomechanically accurate computational modeling methods.

• Mitral Valve Segmentation from Clinical 4D Ultrasound
  

  Visualization and characterization of the mitral valve is especially challenging given its complexity, fast movement, and limitations in current clinical imaging technologies. Oftentimes, acquiring detailed information requires extensive imaging and image processing, which can be time consuming using current methods. This often forces clinicians to make a compromise between speed and completeness of information. We have therefore developed several ultrasound image enhancement and analysis methods to semi-automatically segment the mitral valve from clinical four-dimensional ultrasound and to improve the quality and usefulness of original ultrasound acquisitions. Robert J. Schneider

 
• Computational Modeling of Heart Valves for Surgical Planning
  

  Surgical repair of heart valves is difficult due to complex anatomy and properties of the valve structures. We aim to develop the technology to enable surgeons to use computer simulation to plan surgical repair of heart valves. We have developed fast and biomechanically accurate computational models of both mitral and aortic valves and used them to study issues relevant to surgical repair of valves. Peter E. Hammer

 
• Interactive Surgical Planning
  

  Accelerating the computational valve model, valve mechanics can be simulated at haptic rates, allowing for real-time user interaction. This permits both the assessment of a valve's structure and the virtual implementation of a repair strategy in a manner that is intuitive and interactive. When combined with a patient-specific valve model, such as one generated through advanced ultrasound segmentation, the platform can be used for preoperative planning and case-specific surgeon training. Neil Tenenholtz

 

Robotic Surgery

To perform procedures inside a patient's heart (intracardiac surgery), cardiopulmonary bypass is necessary so the surgeon can work on a relaxed open heart. Although this technique is the current standard, studies have identified numerous adverse effects of a cardiopulmonary bypass. Minimally invasive procedures could eliminate the need for a cardiopulmonary bypass, thereby allowing the surgeon to work directly inside the beating heart. Real-time 3D ultrasound guided minimally invasive robotic surgery have the potential to enable beating heart intracardiac surgery .

• Robotic Catheter
  

  The goal of the robotic catheter project is to develop a platform technology to enable minimally invasive surgery on the inside of the beating heart. The system uses real time 3D ultrasound imaging to control an actuated catheter to compensate for the fast tissue motion. This motion compensation virtually stabilizes the heart motion and allows clinician to perform surgical repair as if the heart was stopped. Samuel Kesner

 
• Real-time 3D Ultrasound Mosaicing and Visualization
  

  Real-time visual feedback of the moving structures is critical to the success of beating heart intracardiac procedures. 3D ultrasound is a promising imaging modality for guiding these procedures. However, its narrow field of view limits its efficacy. One way to overcome this shortcoming is to build a mosaic that offers an extended field of view. Volume registration is done on GPU to enable real-time performance. Laura Brattain

 
• 3D Ultrasound-Guided Robotic Motion Compensation
  

  We have developed a 3D ultrasound-guided motion compensation system that tracks heart motion and allows the surgeon to operate on the fast moving structures of the beating heart without risk of damaging them. This involves real-time processing of 3D ultrasound volumes and the use of an Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) to remove the effects of delay in the imaging system. Shelten Yuen

   

Hands

Current robotic hands are complicated, fragile, and expensive. This limits their use in unstructured environments such as homes, outdoors, and disaster zones. Our research focuses on addressing these problems through several approaches, including the use of mechanical intelligence such as compliant joints, numerical optimization to reduce the complexity of hand actuation, and the development perception and grasping algorithms that use a low-cost, robust sensor suite to operate autonomously.

• Intelligent Passive Mechanics
  

  Grasping involves contact between many different surfaces with messy interaction forces and couplings. Through the use of carefully-chosen passive mechanical designs, it is possible to greatly simplify the control problems to improve performance, decrease expense, and improve the mechanical robustness of robotic hands. Leif Jentoft, Frank Hammond III

 
• Numerical Optimization of Robotic Hands
  

  The design of robotic hands for dexterous grasping and manipulation often leads to fully-actuated, anthropomorphic (biomimetic) solutions. These solutions, however elegant, typically entail complex actuation frameworks that make them expensive and difficult to implement effectively. This research uses novel grasp simulation and design optimization methods to systematically reduce the complexity and cost of robotic hands while promoting improved hand dexterity and grasp robustness. Frank Hammond III

 
• Sensing and Perception
  

  Although the human hand has a very capable sensor suite, thirty years of benchtop research have failed to deliver tactile sensing suites that are robust and inexpensive enough to provide grasping information at a practical cost/benefit ratio. By studying the sensor suite in the context of its application to robotic grasping, we are devel0ping hardware that is inexpensive, robust, and matched to the capabilities of robotic rather than biological fabrication techniques, and perception algorithms to process this data that are robust to the noise and uncertainty present in unstructured environments. Leif Jentoft, Yaroslav Tenzer

 

Rehabilitation Robotics

Stroke and post-operative upper-limb injury patients require continuous rehabilitation to regain normal motor function. Our research focuses on developing cable-driven, wearable rehabilitation devices that can help doctors monitor patient progress and can provide robot-assisted physical therapy both in clinic and at home.

• Soft Orthotics
  

  Design of a lightweight, cost-effective, shoulder rehabilitation device that adapts to anatomical variations in the patient's upper body. This device integrates cable driven actuation and a limb position sensing system to: i) provide passive and active exercises to the arm tailored to the user’s specific shoulder disability and ii) assist in diagnosis and in monitoring patients’ progress.

  Ignacio Galiana, Frank Hammond III, Samuel Kesner, Leif Jentoft, and Marko Popovic
 
• Hand Therapy Exercise Device
  

  We aim to develop a simple, cost-effective hand rehabilitation device using a unique combination of cable actuation and passive return elements. The device will be capable of replicating all of the therapy exercises that are currently performed by occupational therapists on patients. Raye Yeow

 

Haptics

• Effect of Delay and Bandwidth on Haptic Task Performance
  

  One of the haptic devices present in the lab is the Magnetic Levitation Haptic Interface (Butterfly Haptics LLC), which features zero static friction, zero mechanical backlash, and the highest bandwidth and resolution, compared to conventional linkage-based devices. We utilized this state-of-the-art high-fidelity instrument to assess the performances of human subjects in executing haptic assembly tasks under different levels of time delay and bandwidth limitation. Raye Yeow

 
• Tactile Shape Displays
  

  We are developing remote palpation systems to convey tactile information from inside a patient's body to the surgeon's fingertips during minimally invasive procedures. These new instruments will contain tactile sensors that measure pressure distribution on the instruments as tissue is manipulated. The signals from these sensors will be sampled by a dedicated computer system, which will apply appropriate signal processing algorithms. Finally, the tactile information will be conveyed to the surgeon through tactile "display" devices that recreate the remote pressure distribution on the surgeon's fingertips.

Past Projects