Large area tactile and kinaesthetic display system for virtual reality palpation.

In a normal robotic surgical procedure only vision and position feedback is available. Without an equivalent to the sense of touch the surgeon cannot rely anymore on palpation to differentiate between healthy and sick tissue, or to find his/her way into complex often fragile body areas. The proposed research is dedicated to restore the sense of touch, in all its facets, to the surgeon in a robotic surgical procedure where the robot touches the patient and the surgeon interfaces with an advanced joystick and tactile display system in order to command the robot. The proposed  research can largely increase the ‘telepresence’ of the surgeon in robotic surgery and therefore boost the effectiveness and efficiency of this type of intervention. The proposed approach requires that progress is made in measuring – understanding – identifying and replicating palpation patterns. Experiments will be designed to carefully measure and analyse the  surgeon during palpation tasks. Then, methods will be developed to transfer this information towards an artificial system that, designed along the principles of an encountering display system, will be the first in its sort to render a natural palpation feeling to its user. An improved understanding of human palpation, progress in user modelling, intention recognition during palpation tasks, innovative hardware and more natural modus of operandi in robot-assisted surgery will be the main results of the proposed research plan.