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Introduction
Gone are the days of manually twisting nobs to cue in your mm coordinates, now surgery is just another area where the robots are stealing our jobs assisting us with our work. Good thing too, as I don't think I could inject a steady stream of ul volume virus over the course of ten minutes.
Now surgery is daunting enough without having to worry about your skynet-robot botching a craniotomy. That's why it's important that you make sure you're comfortable with using the machine before a rat or mouse even leaves its cage...
That's where this pages comes in, however, keep in mind that this is meant as a high level introduction or refresher. Before using the robotax, be sure to read the instruction manual attached below. It is more detailed than this guide.
Software Overview
The image on the right is what you should see when you start up the robotax software. The two main views show the panel on the right featuring buttons which allow you to move the robot in 3 dimensions, ap, ml, and dv, as well as specify how much for each.
Below this, is the ability to set the axis position, in respect to the frame or bregma/lambda.
At the very bottom of the panel, is the tools button, which will present a menu with various options. On the bottom right is the planning/move options, which allow you to select which view to be in.
Tools menu
Most of the options that'll you'll need are found in the tools menu. Here is an overview of some of the most commonly used ones.
Project - The project section allows you to create, save, and select the atlas type (rat/mouse). You should create a new project for each surgery, to avoid misconfigurations ect.
Calibrate the frame - This is used in the beginning to align the frame and the software. (see image in "Example Workflow")
Correct for tilt and scaling - This is used to have the robotax learn the size of the skull and the skull angles. (see )
Synchronize drill & Syringe - Does what you'd expect, allows the syringe to use the calibration set for the drill.
Drill - Opens up the drill menu for related options (see )
Show injectomate - Displays the menu the injection system. (see )
UNDER CONSTRUCTION: -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Example Workflow
Calibrate the sterotax
tools -> project -> new -> set the atlas to mouse or rat depending on what's sitting on the table in front of you.
open planning, then set coordinates
save
go to tools -> calibrate the frame, and calibrate the sterotax frame
then correct for tilt with lamda and bregma
go to midpoint, then touch the scull on left and right widrill bit. set each point.
move drill to bregma, set bregma //how to swap drill bits
tools-> go to entry for target
tools drill...
place on skull
set skull starting point
to be continued...
by Keiland
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