Robust Autonomous Control of a Magnetic Millirobot in In Vitro Cardiac Flow

TL;DR

This paper introduces a vision-guided control system for magnetic millirobots that achieves precise autonomous navigation in simulated cardiac flow conditions, demonstrating robustness against pulsatile disturbances.

Contribution

It presents a novel control framework combining localization, path planning, and disturbance compensation for reliable millirobot navigation in dynamic in vitro cardiac flow.

Findings

Achieved sub-millimeter accuracy in static fluid conditions.

Reduced tracking error by 37% under moderate pulsatile flow.

Maintained stable navigation under high flow and low viscosity conditions.

Abstract

Untethered magnetic millirobots offer significant potential for minimally invasive cardiac therapies; however, achieving reliable autonomous control in pulsatile cardiac flow remains challenging. This work presents a vision-guided control framework enabling precise autonomous navigation of a magnetic millirobot in an in vitro heart phantom under physiologically relevant flow conditions. The system integrates UNet-based localization, A* path planning, and a sliding mode controller with a disturbance observer (SMC-DOB) designed for multi-coil electromagnetic actuation. Although drag forces are estimated using steady-state CFD simulations, the controller compensates for transient pulsatile disturbances during closed-loop operation. In static fluid, the SMC-DOB achieved sub-millimeter accuracy (root-mean-square error, RMSE = 0.49 mm), outperforming PID and MPC baselines. Under moderate pulsatile flow (7 cm/s peak, 20 cP), it reduced RMSE by 37% and peak error by 2.4$\times$ compared to PID. It further maintained RMSE below 2 mm (0.27 body lengths) under elevated pulsatile flow (10 cm/s peak, 20 cP) and under low-viscosity conditions (4.3 cP, 7 cm/s peak), where baseline controllers exhibited unstable or failed tracking. These results demonstrate robust closed-loop magnetic control under time-varying cardiac flow disturbances and support the feasibility of autonomous millirobot navigation for targeted drug delivery.