Preoperative position planning strategy for laparoscopic robot

Abstract

Laparoscopic robot is used to grasp endoscope to output image of focal area for surgeons in minimally invasive surgery (MIS), so it is necessary to set relative position between laparoscopic robot base and patient's focal area to make all focal points locate into robot workspace. For the reasons of surgeons needing to do much work in preoperative process and many surgical instruments occupying much space in operating room, it is impossible to realize position set by repeated trial and error process in operating room. Therefore, the method of off line simulation is a suitable ways to set laparoscopic robot' position in preoperative process. Through the concepts of service sphere and service region, dexterity distribution of laparoscopic robot is illustrated in workspace, then a robot's position planning method using gradient projection for distance search is recommended. By combining with dexterity distribution of laparoscopic robot and gradient projection method for distance search, a preoperative position planning strategy for laparoscopic robot is given. In the end, simulation and experiment are carried out to validate the effectiveness of planning strategy.