Collaborative Robotic Ultrasound Tissue Scanning for Surgical Resection Guidance in Neurosurgery

TL;DR

This paper presents a robotic ultrasound system designed for autonomous brain tissue scanning to enhance surgical guidance and improve tumor resection accuracy in neurosurgery.

Contribution

Introduction of a robotic platform with advanced 3D tissue reconstruction techniques for autonomous intraoperative ultrasound scanning in neurosurgery.

Findings

Successful development of a robotic ultrasound scanning prototype.

Accurate 3D reconstruction of surgical cavities achieved.

Enhanced guidance for tumor resection demonstrated.

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to introduce a robotic platform for autonomous iUS tissue scanning to optimise intraoperative diagnosis and improve surgical resection during robot-assisted operations. To guide anatomy specific robotic scanning and generate a representation of the robot task space, fast and accurate techniques for the recovery of 3D morphological structures of the surgical cavity are developed. The prototypic DLR MIRO surgical robotic arm is used to control the applied force and the in-plane motion of the US transducer. A key application of the proposed platform is the scanning of brain tissue to guide tumour resection.