Surgical Robotics: Committee Information

IEEE Robotics and Automation's Technical Committee
on:

Surgical Robotics

Scope

The impact of robotic systems and devices on surgery in the next 25 years promises to be comparable to that of manufacturing robots on industrial production over the past 25 years. By extending human surgeons' ability to plan and carry out surgical interventions more accurately and less invasively, surgical robotic systems can address a vital international need to greatly reduce costs, improve clinical outcomes, and improve the efficiency of health care delivery.
The field of medical robotics is relatively new, roughly at the same stage of maturity as manufacturing robotics was in 1980. The first surgical use of robots occurred in the late 1980's, and the first international workshop devoted to medical robots was held in 1988 under IARP sponsorship. Since then, the field has grown from a relative handful of practitioners to a well-recognized sub-discipline within the robotics community, with multiple sessions or tracks at robotics conferences, clinical meetings, and specialized conferences and workshops.
The impact of Surgical Robotics and the interest of RAS members in this field have been demonstrated in the last few years by several successful events organized virtually at all Robotics Conferences, and by the successful Special Issues of the IEEE RAS Transactions and Magazine. Today, a strong need is felt to make further progress that would launch Surgical Robotics beyond current achievements and further disseminate their use and increase their acceptance. Research efforts are needed to: improve the simplicity of use and thus the medical acceptance of current robots (semi-autonomous and teleoperated) for minimally invasive surgery; design new mechatronic hand-held tools capable of augmenting the performance of surgeons; develop new endoscopic robots; investigate new avenues of application in micro and nano surgery, including cellular surgery, and so forth.
As a result, the goal of the Technical Committee is to address the many new and open scientific and technical challenges in Surgical Robotics. The Technical Committee will increase the momentum of this growing research area by helping to organize new conferences such as BioRob 2006; focusing research activities within RAS; establishing links with other technical communities within IEEE (such as EMBS) and outside (for example the communities of surgeons and of economists interested in the acceptance of surgical robotics); create relations with industry.

Objectives:
The IEEE Technical Committee on Surgical Robotics will aim to: foster intellectual exchange among surgical robotics researchers through scientific events and publications, promote discussion on the technical and applicative problems through meetings and Internet forums, and provide researchers with helpful tools for their activity. The Technical Committee will actively work to organize Workshops and Tutorials at RAS Conferences, such as ICRA and IROS, and at other RAS-sponsored meetings; to organize dedicated conferences, and to promote special conference sessions and special issues of international Journals.

Activities

IEEE Transactions on Haptics Special Issue on Haptics in Medicine and Clinical Skill Acquisition Special Issue September 15, 2010 -
Contact Information: Cagatay Basdogan (cbasdogan at ku dot edu dot tr)
The clinical skills of medical professionals rely strongly on the sense of touch, combined with anatomical and diagnostic knowledge. Haptic exploratory procedures allow the expert to detect anomalies via gross and fine palpation, squeezing, and contour following. Haptic feedback is also key to medical interventions, for example when an anaesthetist inserts an epidural needle, a surgeon makes an incision, a dental surgeon drills into a carious lesion, or a veterinarian sutures a wound. Yet current trends in medical technology and training methods involve less haptic feedback to clinicians and trainees. For example, minimally invasive surgery removes the direct contact between the patient and clinician that gives rise to natural haptic feedback. In addition, computer-based simulations are being used to provide objective performance evaluations and make training more efficient. The science and technology of haptics thus has great potential to affect the performance of medical procedures and learning of clinical skills. This special issue is about understanding the role of touch in medicine and clinical skill acquisition. Topics of interest include:

1. Haptic environment properties and human haptic perception as relevant to medical examinations and procedures: Characterization of the nature of haptic information, and how it is perceived, is necessary to understand how medical professionals use haptics to enable learning and achieve high levels of performance. Papers that explore haptic models of the patient, as well as perceptual or behavioral aspects of the haptic modality relevant to medical examinations and procedures, are solicited.

2. Haptic systems and the role of haptics in training and evaluating clinical skills: Haptic simulators address a growing need for effective training and evaluation of clinical skills. Such simulators can be applied in a wide variety of medical professions and disciplines, including surgery, interventional radiology, anaesthesiology, dentistry, veterinary medicine, and the allied health professions. These simulators rely on both technology development (devices, software, and systems) and an understanding of how humans use haptic feedback to perform established clinical skills or learn novel skills. Papers that address simulator development and/or evaluation from these perspectives are solicited.

3. Using haptics to improve the performance of medical interventions: Current trends in minimally invasive surgery (especially robot-assisted surgery) remove direct contact between the patient and the clinician. In addition, some medical interventions, such as percutaneous (e.g., needle-based) therapies, inherently provide little or confounded haptic feedback to the clinician. Bilateral teleoperators, tactile sensing/display devices, sensory substitutions systems, and other methods to enhance haptic feedback to a clinician could improve the performance of interventions. Papers that address technological approaches and their evaluation, as well as how humans use haptics (natural or with artificial haptic feedback) to accomplish medical tasks with better performance are solicited.

Timeline
15 September 2010 Deadline for submission of papers
15 December 2010 First decisions to authors
21 March 2011 Second decisions to authors
22 April 2011 Final publication materials due from authors
15 June 2011 Special issue publication

Submission Process
Visit http://www.computer.org/toh to view formatting requirements, and submit your paper at https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/cs ieee. When uploading your paper, please select the appropriate special issue title under the category “Manuscript Type”. Questions about this process should be directed to the journal administrator, Mr. Joel T. Luber, at toh@computer.org. For more information about this special issue, contact any of the Guest Editors below.
2010 North American Summer School in Surgical Robotics and Simulation Summer School August 23, 2010 - University of Washington
This event will invite about 50 early-career researchers, primarily doctoral students, to a 5 day intensive series of 90 minute tutorial lectures, hands-on labs, and informal interactions designed to rapidly bring them up to the state of the art in this rapidly expanding field. Students accepted at the school will attend all five days and learn from an international faculty specially recruited for the event.
ICRA 2010 Workshop: Medical Cyber-Physical Systems Workshop May 7, 2010 - Anchorage, AK
Contact Information: Ron Alterovitz (ron at cs dot unc dot edu)
The goal of this workshop is to expose and explore current research issues in advanced medical systems in which computation is intimately coupled to physical systems and humans. The integration of computation with physical systems has the potential to improve speed, precision, and dexterity during robot-assisted surgery as well as enable new medical procedures. This full-day workshop will bring together researchers and practitioners to discuss new and emerging algorithms, devices, sensors, and user interfaces for medical cyber-physical systems, including robotic surgical assistants and other medical robotic systems. We will focus on both computation to improve the planning, control, and effectiveness of these systems as well as new devices and hardware that enable more dexterity and better sensing. We will share, discuss, and develop new ideas regarding the following major research challenges in medical cyber-physical systems: planning and automating surgical tasks; guidance via imaging, vision, and novel sensors; modeling and descriptions of surgical tasks; interoperable tele-operation for telesurgery; tissue models for control and design of interventional systems; beating heart surgery; advanced user interfaces for medical devices; and benchmarks for evaluation of surgical performance.
ICRA 2010 Workshop: Meso-Scale Robotics for Medical Interventions Workshop May 3, 2010 - Anchorage, AK
Contact Information: Jaydev Desai (jaydev at umd dot edu)
Full Day workshop: There has been a significant development in medical robotics from basic research to product development, evaluation, and feasibility studies. Surgical robotics strives to make surgical interventions less invasive, less risky for both patients and clinicians, more efficient, less costly, and capable of achieving better patient outcomes. While medical robotics in the early stages was primarily targeted towards large-scale interventions, the trend nowadays is towards developing small-scale devices. The focus of this workshop is primarily geared towards meso-scale (order of 1mm-100mm at most) devices for medical interventions. Rapid progress in recent years in computer processing power, faster communication capabilities for wirelessly controlling devices, coupled with high-resolution imaging capabilities such as CT, PET, and MRI, has enabled the evaluation and testing of these devices more easily than was previously possible. With the current trends in micro- and meso-scale device development, it seems likely that the current generation of operating robots will be replaced by a second generation that meets more closely the requirements of in situ diagnosis and treatment. These robots will be easily reconfigured to progress rapidly from one patient and procedure to another. They will also enable many clinicians to perform procedures with competence that only a few clinicians now have; they will also allow clinicians to perform procedures that cannot be done with existing technology.
ICRA 2010 Workshop: Snakes, Worms and Catheters: Continuum and Serpentine Robots for Minimally Invasive Surgery Workshop May 3, 2010 - Anchorage, AK
Contact Information: Mohsen Mahvash Pierre E. Dupont and (Pierre dot Dupont at childrens dot harvard dot edu; mohsen dot mahvash-mohammady at childrens dot harvard dot )
A broad variety of serpentine and continuum robots have been developed for minimally invasive surgical applications. These vary in size from less than a millimeter to several centimeters in diameter and include flexible needles, robotic catheters, multi-segmented sheaths for NOTES applications, snake-like robots capable of suturing and inchworm devices that can move over the heart. While these devices share many common features, little effort has been devoted to exploring and exploiting these commonalities. This workshop focuses on bringing together interested researchers in academia and industry to identify unifying research questions and approaches for these types of devices.
12th International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention (MICCAI) Conference September 20, 2009 - London, United Kingdom
From the Conference Website:

MICCAI 2009, the 12th International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention, will be held from 20th to 24th September 2009 in London, UK. MICCAI attracts annually world leading scientists, engineers and clinicians from a wide range of disciplines associated with medical imaging and computer assisted surgery.

Topics to be addressed in MICCAI 2009 include, but are not limited to:
* General Medical Image Computing
* Computer Assisted Interventional Systems and Robotics
* Visualisation and Interaction
* General Biological and Neuroscience Image Computing
* Computational Anatomy (statistics on anatomy)
* Computational Physiology (virtual organs)
* Innovative Clinical/Biological Applications and Surgical Procedures
Medicine Meets Virtual Reality (MMVR) 2009 Conference January 19, 2009 - Long Beach, CA
From the Conference Web-site:
------------------------------
MMVR is the premier conference on emerging data-centered technologies for medical care and education. It brings together an interdisciplinary, vanguard community of computer scientists and engineers, physicians and surgeons, medical educators and students, military medicine specialists, and biomedical futurists.

The MMVR17 Organizing Committee invites presentations on:

* Biomedical and surgical modeling and simulation
* Imaging, data visualization and fusion
* Intelligence networking and telemedicine
* Robotics and haptics
* Interfaces, displays, and projection methods
* Sensors, implantable and wearable electronics
* Virtual, mixed, and augmented reality
* Game-based learning and performance assessment
Winter School on Medical Robotics and Computer-Integrated Interventional Systems Tutorial January 12, 2009 - The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland
From the Winter School web site:

The NSF Engineering Research Center for Computer-integrated Surgical Systems and Technology (CISST ERC) is proud to present a week-long "winter school" on medical robotics and computer-integrated interventional medicine. Co-organized with the 10th year celebration of the CISST ERC, this intensive short course will include tutorial lectures and research talks by internationally recognized faculty, lab tours & demonstrations in our new facilities in the Computational Sciences and Engineering Building on the Johns Hopkins Homewood Campus, and a compressed version of Johns Hopkins' unique Surgery for Engineers course.
The course is open to graduate students and young professionals beginning research in this exciting and rapidly expanding field.
AVAILABLE IMMEDIATELY - Post-Doc in Surgical Robotics for an NIH project at University of Maryland, College Park Announcement September 13, 2008 - University of Maryland, College Park.
Contact Information: Jaydev Desai (jaydev at umd dot edu)
Position description:

Research Associate (Post-Doc) position in Surgical Robotics for the design, development, and implementation of a teleoperated robotic system with haptic feedback capability for breast biopsy (Bx) and radio-frequency ablation (RFA) of breast tumor under continuous Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) is available immediately for a National Institutes of Health (NIH) R01 project. The selected candidate will also be involved in the currently funded NIH R21 grant on the development of a highly dexterous Minimally Invasive Neurosurgical Intracranial Robot (MINIR) teleoperated under continuous MRI.

Required expertise:
Expertise in one or more of the areas relating to: robot kinematics and dynamics, teleoperated needle guidance and steering, stability issues in teleoperation, nonlinear control, and haptics is strongly desired. Strong hardware design and integration skills and expertise in C++ is a pre-requisite.

Selection of potential candidates will begin immediately.

Application package:

Interested candidates should submit the following by email in a single PDF file to jaydev@umd.edu.

1. Curriculum vitae with a list of at least 3 references
2. At least three papers which could be either published, accepted for publication, or in-preparation which demonstrate some of the required expertise mentioned above.
3. Relevant courses taken during Ph.D studies
4. Expected date of graduation (for those who are currently pursuing a Ph.D)
5. Doctoral dissertation topic
6. A one-page summary of research background and interests and how it aligns with the current position.

Contact Information:
Jaydev P. Desai
Associate Professor
Director - Robotics, Automation, Manipulation, and Sensing (RAMS) Laboratory
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Room 0160, Bldg 088, Glenn L. Martin Hall
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742
Phone: 301-405-4427
Fax: 301-314-9477
Web: http://rams.umd.edu/
Workshop on Needle Steering at MICCAI 2008 Workshop September 6, 2008 - New York, NY
Contact Information: Ron Alterovitz (ronalt at berkeley dot edu)
The goal of this workshop is to bring together researchers from the biomedical engineering, imaging, and robotics communities to discuss recent results and open problems in the development of medical needle steering technologies. Needle insertion is a critical step in many diagnostic and therapeutic medical procedures, from biopsies to anesthesia injections to brachytherapy cancer treatment. Due to their improved maneuverability, steerable needles have the potential to enable clinicians to accurately and precisely insert needles to targets previously inaccessible to traditional stiff needles. The purpose of this workshop is to serve as a comprehensive forum to discuss all aspects of the development of steerable needles. The oral presentations and posters will cover a variety of topics including modeling needle/tissue interaction, simulation, planning and control, hardware system design, image-guidance, and clinical application.
Medical robots: Swallow the surgeon Publication - News Media September 4, 2008 - The Economist
From the article: "Tiny medical robots are being developed that could perform surgery inside patients with greater precision than existing methods."
BioRob2008 - IEEE RAS / EMBS International Conference on Biomedical Robotics and Biomechatronics Conference May 20, 2008 - Scottsdale, Arizona, USA
Contact Information: Jaydev Desai (jaydev at umd dot edu)
The second IEEE RAS / EMBS International Conference on Biomedical Robotics and Biomechatronics – BioRob 2008 – is a joint effort of the two IEEE Societies of Robotics and Automation – RAS – and Engineering, Medicine, and Biology – EMBS.

BioRob covers both theoretical and experimental challenges posed by the application of robotics and mechatronics in medicine and biology. The primary focus of Biorobotics is to analyze biological systems from a “biomechatronic” point of view, trying to understand the scientific and engineering principles underlying their extraordinary performance. This profound understanding of how biological systems work, behave and interact can be used for two main objectives: to guide the design and fabrication of novel, high performance bio-inspired machines and systems, for many different applications; and to develop novel nano-, micro-, macro- devices that can act upon, substitute parts of, and assist human beings in diagnosis, surgery, prosthetics, rehabilitation and personal assistance.

BioRob is a highly interdisciplinary conference that brings together scientists and engineers from different backgrounds to share and learn about research activities in this fast growing field. The IEEE RAS and EMBS share this vision and thus jointly sponsor this conference.

The IEEE BIOROB 2008 Conference includes:

* Plenary Speeches by prominent researchers/practitioners in the field of Biorobotics.
* Oral presentations of papers in parallel organized sessions.
* Mini-Symposiums.
* Workshops on fields of interest to the Biorobotics community.

Technical Program will consist of technical tracks featuring:

* Biologically-inspired systems
* Biomechatronic systems
* Biorobotics
* Exoskeletons and augmenting devices
* Human-machine interaction
* Locomotion and manipulation in robots and biological systems
* Micro/nano technologies in medicine and biology
* Modeling interactions between robots and biological systems
* Neuro-robotics
* Protheses
* Rehabilitiation and assistive robotics
* Surgery and diagnosis
Surgical Simulation Post-Doc available at University of Maryland, College Park. Announcement May 25, 2007 - University of Maryland, College Park
Contact Information: Jaydev Desai (jaydev at umd dot edu)
Post-Doc position:

Post-Doc position in Surgical Simulation is available for a National Institutes of Health (NIH) project on developing a reality-based surgical simulator. Cornell University is also one of the other participating institutions. University of Maryland Post-Doc position is for a candidate with mechanics based expertise in modeling soft-tissue for probing, cutting, dissection, and electrocautery. There will be data collection from animals as part of this project. Prior experience with modeling in finite element software such as ABAQUS, ANSYS, or self-developed finite element software is desirable. Analytical soft-tissue interaction models developed at University of Maryland from experimental measurements on live animals as well as ex-vivo tissue will be provided to Cornell University to develop a Data-driven real-time graphics simulator. These models will also be displayed on a haptic feedback display which will be combined with the graphics simulator developed at Cornell University. Learning curves and task completion accuracy will be assessed for surgeons and residents in our real-time haptics and graphics based simulator and compared with operating room (OR) procedures and commercial surgical simulator.

Required expertise: Knowledge of solid mechanics including developing or working with a finite element software such as ABAQUS and ANSYS.
Desirable expertise: Hardware design and integration for haptic feedback interface, robotics, expertise in programming in C++.

Interested candidates should submit the following by email in a single PDF file to jaydev@umd.edu. Review of applications will begin June 25, 2007. Expected start date for the position is September 1, 2007 or earlier.

1. Curriculum vitae
2. At least three papers which could be either published, accepted for publication, or in-preparation
3. Relevant courses taken
4. Expected date of graduation (for those who are currently pursuing a Ph.D)
5. Doctoral dissertation topic
6. A one-page summary of research background and interests and how it aligns with the current position.
Computer-Integrated Surgery and Interventional Robotics Tutorial April 10, 2007 - Rome, Italy
Contact Information: Gabor Fichtinger (gabor at cs dot jhu dot edu)
Tutorial Speakers: Gabor , Russell Taylor, Gregory Hager, Allison Okamura, Noah Cowan, Peter Kazanzides
Medicine Meets Virtual Reality (MMVR) 2007 Conference February 9, 2007 - Long Beach, CA
Contact Information: Desai Jaydev (jaydev at umd dot edu)
From the Conference Web-site:
------------------------------

MMVR is the premier conference on emerging data-centered technologies for medical care and education.

MMVR is a multidisciplinary forum for computer scientists and engineers, physicians and surgeons, medical educators and students, military medicine specialists, and biomedical futurists. At MMVR, developers and end-users collaborate and innovate.

MMVR encourages a critical examination of current progress: from initial vision and prototypes, through assessment and validation, to clinical and academic utilization and commercialization. MMVR supports improved precision, efficiency, and outcomes in clinical diagnosis and therapy, medical education, and public health.

MMVR creates a vanguard community of thinkers that envisions and makes real the future of medicine. MMVR turns vision into proficy™.
Intra-Cellular Surgery: A New Frontier? Organized Session February 8, 2007 - Long Beach, CA
Contact Information: Desai Jaydev (jaydev at umd dot edu)
Session Abstract provided by Dr. Richard Satava:
------------------------------------------------

As technological advances push the boundaries of what is possible in surgery, one new frontier that will be breached by surgery is the world of the small - the intra-cellular level. There are new instruments (such as femtosecond lasers, optical tweezers, atomic force microscopes, etc) which will now permit interacting directly with individual components within the living cell without damage to the cell. To date, all interactions with cells has been biochemical, in terms of markers, labels, transfections, genetic transmutations, etc. Nothing has been explored in terms of the anatomy or structural and mechanical properties of cells - which is the domain of surgery. It is known that cells are in constant motion, that they 'interact' with each other across the cell membrane, and that their shapes are constantly changing. No one has explored why a cell only has a certain number of components, what arrangement they have within the cell, or what would happen if additional structures (eg Golgi apparatus, ribosomes,etc) would be introduced. With all the new tools available, the direct manipulation of cells and their components should now move out of the biology laboratory and into clinical research and medicine. By directly operating upon cells it will be possible to change the biology of the cells, and a person - the new discipline of Biosurgery.
ITWBioRob 2006 (1st International Technical Workshop on BioRobotics) Workshop December 12, 2006 - Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Contact Information: Mitsuishi Mamoru (mamoru at nml dot t dot u-tokyo dot ac dot jp)
This workshop will be from December 12-14, 2006.

There will be more than 12 lectures covering the general, technical, and clinical issues of surgical robotics technology, which include:

A) General:
# State-of-the-art surveys & future trends of surgical robotics technology
# Safety issues
# Entrepreneurship & commercialization

B) Technical:
# Biopsy & Surgery in Urology
# Cardiac Surgery
# Endoscopic Surgery
# Haptics
# High Intensity Focused Ultrasound Therapy
# Laparoscopic Surgery
# Manipulator Design
# Microsurgery
# Neurosurgery
# Orthopedic Surgery
# Registration & Navigation
Etc.

C) Clinical:
# Surgeons' perspectives of robotic technology
Doc at a Distance Publication - Article October 1, 2006 - IEEE Spectrum
Contact Information: Blake Hannaford (blake at ee dot washington dot edu)
Biomechanics, Bio-Robotics, and Surgical Planning Theme September 3, 2006 - New York, NY
Contact Information: Jaydev Desai (desai at coe dot drexel dot edu)
For EMBC 2006, you are invited to submit papers in the above theme in the areas of:
1. Cellular Surgery - Track Chairs: Jaydev P. Desai (Drexel University) and Yu Sun (University of Toronto)
2. Surgical Robotics - Track Chair: William Peine, Purdue University
3. BioRobotics - Track Chair: Paolo Dario, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Pisa, Italy
Robotic Cellular Surgery using Haptic and Vision feedback Workshop August 31, 2006 - New York, NY
Contact Information: Jaydev Desai (desai at coe dot drexel dot edu)
Bio-surgery on individual cells, ordered cell arrays or embryos will be the platform for the next generation of genetic manipulation. Manipulations may include correctional interventions during early stages of fetal development, treatment of diseased areas in the body without the required resection or organ transplantation, and cell specific delivery of a wide range of other molecular and nanotechnology applications. To achieve bio-surgery reliably and accurately, operators must have accurate haptic ("feel") and visual feedback from the cell during intracellular manipulations. Bio-surgeons can use a haptic and visual feedback system to manipulate an individual cell or array of cells in order to standardize outcomes of cellular surgical procedures. Further advancement of this technology will lead to reproducible results of gene injection at specific target sites within a cell, embryo, organism or organ. Potential applications of this technology include cellular repair by site-specific delivery of repair enzymes, organelle interventions that would effect post translational modification of proteins or respiratory rates in mitochondria, genetic engineering of stem cells for organogenesis, and genetic engineering within specific organs to combat genetic deficiencies or produce supra-physiologic organ function.

The workshop is intended for Biomedical Engineers, MEMS and Nanotechnology disciplines, Surgeons interested in Gene therapy, Biologists, etc.
BioRobotics Conference February 22, 2006 - Pisa, Italy

Background

URL:http://thth.berkeley.edu/tab-db/committeeinfo.php?tcid=24
Founding Date: January 1, 1969
Member Count: 409
Fall 2010 Committee Chairs:
- Desai, Jaydev (jaydev at umd dot edu)
  - University of Maryland, College Park
  - corresponding chair - send email to join committee
- MITSUISHI, MAMORU (mamoru at nml dot t dot u-tokyo dot ac dot jp)
  - The University of Tokyo
  - corresponding chair - send email to join committee
- Alterovitz, Ron (ron at cs dot unc dot edu)
  - University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
- Bernardes, Mariana (bernardes at ieee dot org)
  - Universidade de Brasília
  - corresponding chair - send email to join committee
Committee Chairs Emeritus:
- Taylor, Russell (rht at cs dot jhu dot edu)
  - Johns Hopkins University
- Hannaford, Blake (blake at ee dot washington dot edu)
  - University of Washington
- Tendick, Frank (frankt at itsa dot ucsf dot edu)
  - University of California, San Francisco
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