Future of Surgical Robots in Space

Paper number

IAC-07-A5.2.07

Author

Mr. Tamas Haidegger, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary

Year

2007

Abstract

In case of long duration manned space missions–such as the scheduled manned Mars mission or the permanent Moon base–there is an increased health risk. The chance of sudden illnesses such as appendicitis or renal calculus cannot be excluded. Today the only alternative is to bring back the astronauts to Earth. In future space exploration, patients will have to be operated in a manner not to endanger the success of the whole mission. Manned space projects have always been cost demanding due to the increased security measures required to keep the astronauts safe. Teleoperated surgical robotic systems offer a technological solution and alternative to keep a trained surgeon on board all the time.  
Surgical robotics and complete teleoperated surgical systems represent an emerging field of medical robotics. The most well known robots are the da Vinci system form Intuitive Surgical and Zeus from Computer Motion. These structures are capable of performing complex surgical procedures with laparoscopic technique, guided by a skilled surgeon remotely. The master console can be located thousands of miles away as experiments have already proved. There exist several alternative concepts to the classical laparoscopic surgical robots. 
The aim of this paper is to present a surgical system that could accompany the first astronauts to their historical journey to Mars. By integrating cutting-edge technical solutions, a teleoperated, semi-autonomous robots could ensure the medical support for the 2-3-year-long mission. Besides the several advantages, technical difficulties should be dealt with. Most important is the latency time occurred from the transmission through long distance. Several methods are examined to overcome the problems in robot control caused by the signal delay. Astronauts should be trained to monitor on-site any surgical procedures, and be able to interact in case of immediate danger. Security and reliability is even more important than performance, therefore special 3-layered architecture is proposed to increase the robustness of the system. The design of the whole surgical platform and linked communication centre are to be presented.   
The continuous development of space robots has already had significant results in case of terrestrial spin-offs. The technology originally developed for space can solve various problems on the ground. Advanced teleoperated surgical platforms could have a great impact in remote health procedures, using the semi-autonomous techniques invented for manned space missions.

Abstract document

IAC-07-A5.2.07.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-07-A5.2.07.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

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