Control Method for Surgical Robot to Prevent Overload at Vulnerable Tissue

Organs have many vulnerable tissues such as blood vessels and nerves which must never be damaged. This paper shows a control method which prevents the overload of vulnerable tissues. Firstly, the force control method, which prevents overload, is shown. Secondly, a FEM-based stress observer using the organ model is described. Finally, a control method incorporating the first and second steps, and which prevents overload at vulnerable tissue, is shown. Based on the experimental result of positional and stress data; it is shown that the stress at vulnerable tissues didn't widely exceed limit stress, in the event that a target position potentially resulting in damage to vulnerable tissue was ordered.