Design of a Multi-bending Flexible Manipulator for Gastrointestinal Surgery

Unlike the existing rigid surgical robots, flexible endoscopic robotic platforms have been actively researched owing to the advantages of high lesion accessibility and scar-free. However, there still exists difficult-to-access areas such as cardia and fundus in the gastrointestinal tract due to the limited Degrees of Freedom (DoFs) of the manipulator. In this study, we propose a multi-bending endoscopic manipulator to improve accessibility to the gastric region in any position and orientation. We perform mechanism design, kinematics, and cable-control analysis of the proposed manipulator. Finally, we verify the multi-bending motion in the simulated flexible pathway.