Collaborative Robot Arm Inserting Nasopharyngeal Swabs with Admittance Control

TL;DR

This paper explores using a compliant control system with a standard robotic arm to perform nasopharyngeal swab tests, demonstrating improved performance over basic control methods in a simulated environment.

Contribution

It introduces a force sensing end-effector and a torque-controlled compliant control approach for robotic NP swab insertion using a common robotic arm.

Findings

Compliant control outperforms basic position control in swab insertion tasks.

The system shows promise for safe, autonomous NP testing.

Challenges remain in initial alignment and head motion compensation.

Abstract

The nasopharyngeal (NP) swab sample test, commonly used to detect COVID-19 and other respiratory illnesses, involves moving a swab through the nasal cavity to collect samples from the nasopharynx. While typically this is done by human healthcare workers, there is a significant societal interest to enable robots to do this test to reduce exposure to patients and to free up human resources. The task is challenging from the robotics perspective because of the dexterity and safety requirements. While other works have implemented specific hardware solutions, our research differentiates itself by using a ubiquitous rigid robotic arm. This work presents a case study where we investigate the strengths and challenges using compliant control system to accomplish NP swab tests with such a robotic configuration. To accomplish this, we designed a force sensing end-effector that integrates with the proposed torque controlled compliant control loop. We then conducted experiments where the robot inserted NP swabs into a 3D printed nasal cavity phantom. Ultimately, we found that the compliant control system outperformed a basic position controller and shows promise for human use. However, further efforts are needed to ensure the initial alignment with the nostril and to address head motion.