An Ethernet to FireWire bridge for real-time control of the da Vinci Research Kit (dVRK)

In this paper, a real-time control network based on Ethernet and FireWire is presented, where Ethernet provides a convenient, cross-platform interface between a central control PC and a FireWire subnetwork that contains multiple distributed nodes (I/O boards). Real-time performance is achieved because this architecture limits the number of Ethernet transactions on the host PC, benefits from the availability of real-time Ethernet drivers, and uses the broadcast and peer-to-peer capabilities of FireWire to efficiently transfer data among the distributed nodes. This approach and resulting benefits are comparable to EtherCAT, but preserves existing investments in FireWire-based controllers and relies only on conventional, vendor-neutral network hardware and protocols. The system performance is demonstrated on the da Vinci Research Kit (dVRK), which consists of 8 FireWire nodes that control 2 Master Tool Manipulators (MTMs) and 2 Patient Side Manipulators (PSMs), for a total of 28 axes. This approach is generally applicable to interface existing FireWire-based systems to new control PCs via Ethernet or to serve as an open-source alternative to EtherCAT for new designs.