A Robotic System for Overlapping Radiofrequency Ablation in Large Tumor Treatment

Overlapping radiofrequency ablation (RFA) in large tumor treatment requires multiple insertions of electrodes, which often compromise its efficacy and predictability. Surgical robot is a promising candidate for the execution of multiple RFA in large tumor treatment in terms of accuracy and speed. In this paper, we share our experience of design and implementation of a novel robotic system specialized for overlapping RFA. It consists of two components: a robotic manipulator and an automatic ablation planning module. The manipulator architecture is designed to facilitate the kinematic requirement for the multiple overlapping ablation technique within the constraints of minimally invasive surgery. An efficient “Voxel Growing” algorithm is adopted to automatically produce the ablation points according to the tumor's profile. The feasibility of the proposed robotic system is demonstrated by extensive simulation- and experiment-based evaluation conducted on ex vivo porcine liver.