Browse Technologies

• 
• 
• 
• 

Vanderbilt researchers have developed a new system to detect the position, orientation, and pressure exerted on surrounding tissues of a wireless capsule endoscopy device.  Magnetic coupling is one of the few physical phenomena capable of transmitting actuation forces across a physical barrier.  Magnetic manipulation has the potential to make surgery less invasive, by allowing untethered miniature devices to enter the body through natural orifices or tiny incisions, and then maneuver with minimal disruption to healthy tissue.  In order to accomplish this goal, the pose (position and orientation) of the medical device must be available in real time.

Vanderbilt researchers have developed a novel method for enabling tentacle-like robots to reach into tight spaces in manufacturing or medical applications. This is useful for industrial inspection tasks, assembly of products like airplane wings with complex geometry, or making medical endoscopes reach places in the body they cannot reach today. The new invention involves routing actuation wires along a flexible arm through curved paths along the robot

Researchers at Vanderbilt have created a novel control of an (myoelectric) arm prosthesis consisting of at least an elbow joint with the possibility of an additional single or multi-axis wrist joint.

Inventors at Vanderbilt University have developed a robotic platform capable of guaranteeing a degree of agility, mechanical stability, power, reliability, comparable to a standard robotic platform for laparoscopic surgery, but characterized by a much lower invasiveness.