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(Cool, or Sci-Fi Creepy?) Robot Performs 1stAbdominal Surgery Without Human Help

Ateam from Johns Hopkins University successfully used a robot to perform acomplex abdominal surgery — this time, without guidance from humans.

The STAR, short for SmartTissue Autonomous Robot, operated on the soft tissue of pigs to reconnect twoends of an intestine, which is said to be one of the most intricate anddelicate tasks in abdominal surgery.Researchers say, “The STAR performed the procedurein four animals and it produced significantly better results than humansperforming the same procedure.”

The STAR has high repetitive motion and precision capability.Along with high precision imaging for accuracy, researchers say it can adjustto soft-tissue changes in real-time. Soft-tissue can be tricky to operate on —for humans or a robot — because the subtle movements in the texture areunpredictable.

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