Investigation of bioinspired gecko fibers to improve adhesion of HeartLander surgical robot

Giuseppe Tortora, Paul Glass, Nathan Wood, Burak Aksak, Arianna Menciassi, Metin Sitti, Cameron Riviere

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

7 Scopus citations

Abstract

HeartLander is a medical robot proposed for minimally invasive epicardial intervention on the beating heart. To date, all prototypes have used suction to gain traction on the epicardium. Gecko-foot-inspired micro-fibers have been proposed for repeatable adhesion to surfaces. In this paper, a method for improving the traction of HeartLander on biological tissue is presented. The method involves integration of gecko-inspired fibrillar adhesives on the inner surfaces of the suction chambers of HeartLander. Experiments have been carried out on muscle tissue ex vivo assessing the traction performance of the modified HeartLander with bio-inspired adhesive. The adhesive fibers are found to improve traction on muscle tissue by 57.3 %.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publication2012 Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, EMBC 2012
Pages908-911
Number of pages4
DOIs
StatePublished - 2012
Event34th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, EMBS 2012 - San Diego, CA, United States
Duration: Aug 28 2012Sep 1 2012

Publication series

NameProceedings of the Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, EMBS
ISSN (Print)1557-170X

Conference

Conference34th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, EMBS 2012
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CitySan Diego, CA
Period08/28/1209/1/12

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