Research & Projects

Haptic feedback provides users with a sense of touch, effectively bridging the gap between them and virtual environments or remote systems. This technology has gained significant popularity in virtual reality (VR) and teleoperation, as it enhances the realism and immersion of human-computer interactions. In particular, haptic feedback in teleoperation has been shown to significantly improve performance and outcomes, especially in applications such as surgical and healthcare robotics, remote manipulation in hazardous environments, and industrial assembly. Despite the proven success of incorporating haptic feedback into input devices, challenges remain in designing systems that can effectively render a variety of different, clear haptic sensations. In this work, we propose a novel multi-modal cutaneous haptic feedback device for teleoperation. The device is capable of delivering skin stretch, slip, normal indentation, and vibration feedback to the user during teleoperation tasks.

Concentric tube robots (CTRs) offer significant advantages in terms of size and dexterity, making them well-suited to address the unique challenges presented by minimally invasive surgery. However, most existing design frameworks for continuum robots, including CTRs, do not consider the impact of manufacturing uncertainty in the design process, leading to uncertainties in transferring simulations to real-world applications. In this work, we identify and consider two primary sources of manufacturing uncertainties for CTRs: the diameters and curvatures of CTR tubes. We propose a generilizable end-to-end design workflow for manufacturing that incorporates a two-step design optimization and an uncertainty-based selection of manufacturing tolerances, applied to microlaryngeal surgery as a case study. The simulation results indicate that fabrication tolerances of tube curvature significantly affect the physical robot's performance and should be considered in the design process to minimize the gap between the optimization goal and robot performance in the real world. Two hardware experiments were conducted to validate the CTRs design. First, we verified that the physical robot's performance aligns the optimization goal within the simulated probability distribution. Subsequently, we demonstrated that the optimized CTR tube design and the proposed system are feasible for successfully executing a biopsy task.

Our robotics team designed and built a 4-axis industrial robot, handling everything from mechanical design and analysis to control systems and tuning, aimed at optimizing performance for the Taiwan Robot Competition. Ultimately, our efforts led to a 2nd place finish, distinguished by precision and cycle-time. In addition, we proposed a automation pipeline using two robotic arms and a mobile robot for the factory automation task. 

Concentric tube robots (CTRs) show particular promise for minimally invasive surgery due to their inherent compliance and ability to navigate in constrained environments. Due to variations in anatomy among patients and variations in task requirements among procedures, it is necessary to customize the design of these robots on a patient- or population-specific basis. However, the complex kinematics and large design space make the design problem challenging. Here we propose a compu- tational framework that can efficiently optimize a robot design and a motion plan to enable safe navigation through the patient’s anatomy. The current framework is the first fully gradient- based method for CTR design optimization and motion planning, enabling an efficient and scalable solution for simultaneously optimizing continuous variables, even across multiple anatomies. The framework is demonstrated using two clinical examples, laryngoscopy and heart biopsy, where the optimization problems are solved for a single patient and across multiple patients, respectively.

Technological advancements in video equipment and biocompatible materials has enabled improvements in complex surgery through small incisions. The mastery of these laparoscopic surgical techniques is now a requirement for surgeons, however, the necessary skills are not intuitive and require hundreds of practice hours. The current state of surgical education includes animate models, inanimate physical models, and computer-based simulations, the latter of which are limited by cost, accessibility, and a lack of engagement. We propose a novel low-cost training interface that mimics the laparoscopic surgical environment using customized instruments whose movement and control are used as inputs for video games. The system is significantly less expensive than commercial systems and allows users freedom to select and play any game, enabling a take-home system with potential for higher levels of engagement, as well as familiarity and expertise with ambidextrous laparoscopic hand motion. A preliminary study compared performance on FLS (Fundamentals of Laparoscopic Surgery) testing before and after training. For a precision cutting task, groups that trained on a standard simulator or on the new system with either a non-inverted or inverted hand-instrument mapping, showed statistically significant improvements, warranting further investigation of training with this new system.

Concentric tube robots (CTRs) consist of a set of telescoping, pre-curved tubes, whose overall shape can be actively controlled by translating and rotating the tubes with respect to each other. The majority of CTRs to date consist of piecewise constant-curvature tubes, with a straight section followed by a single constant-curvature section. Several approaches have been proposed for CTR designs that can lead to improvements in metrics such as the workspace, orientability, dexterity, and stability. Here we propose to use CTRs with mul- tiple constant-curvature sections. We perform two simulation studies that compare the performance of the multiple constant- curvature CTRs with standard single constant-curvature tubes. We also demonstrate how using one of the proposed multiple constant-curvature designs can enable the reduction in the number of tubes needed to achieve the same performance as a standard three-tube CTR.