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Most precision brain surgery is done with robotic assistance, but there's one place robots can't go: inside MRI brain scanners. Enter the neuroArm, a robot specially designed to work inside the powerful magnet of an MRI — and guided by the detailed images the MRI creates. Developed by surgeons and robotics experts at University of Calgary, the neuroArm combines the best of telepresence surgery with the best imaging technology. But how do you create a sophisticated robot, with delicate actuators, that can withstand being destroyed by a giant magnet? We've got the answer, and cool videos of the arm in action, below.
Here's an artist's rendering of a person undergoing brain surgery inside an MRI machine. Now surgeons can guide the robotic arms with even more precision, seeing exactly where each surgical tool goes as it enters your gray matter. So what is the robotic arm made of? Check out what the roboticists and surgeons who built it have to say in this video. And here's another picture of neuroArm, the brain surgery robot. Yup, it's just plain cool. 
Images via AP.
And here's another picture of neuroArm, the brain surgery robot. Yup, it's just plain cool.
Project neuroArm [University of Calgary]
Comments
operating on a cell?!?!
thats just plain frickin' awesome. Canada should be proud.
...but what will happen to McDreamy?
(Did I say that outloud?)
A robot we can't kill with magnets? Way to doom us all, Canada.
Ah, sneaky Mechanical and Electrical engineers.
First create the robots to help people with their jobs, then, when they least expect it, BAM! Introduce the robots that replace them.
so they say what it's made of but they never mention how they managed to get it to move mechanically without using motors. i'm betting it's some kind of hydrolics.
Who needs a surgeon? We'll all be going to the most skilled programer.
That's awesome.
I want to use that the next time I need brain surgery.
people shouldnt be so afraid of robots replacing humanity. after all, long before robots can become self reliant we will ourselves be mostly integrated circuitry and robotics
Could that be used to do coils on brain aneurysms? My mom had a ruptured brain aneurysm (she's fine now) but the procedure requires a great deal of precision so even if you make it out of surgery just fine, complications could arise post op and and become life-threatening.
@92BuickLeSabre: duh everyone knows McSteamy is the better doctor.
@thechansen: Exactly. And he doesn't do brain surgery. So he's safe; but McDreamy....
(Wait, why did I continue this conversation?)
I've always maintained that surgeons are merely skilled technicians, and should be paid like other skilled technicians. Like an auto mechanic, they do something that most people can't necessarily do for themselves, and if they screw up, people might die.
Perhaps these 'bots will knock them down from the ridiculous pinnacle they've put themselves atop, with the help of their disgusting AMA monopoly.
Nifty robot.
-Kle.
Finally, the blood monkies will be replaced by machines! Yeah, Dr. Jones can fix your heart or lungs or whatever, but because they've become good human mechanics, they think they deserve to make millions.
Some pretty cool materials will be involved - to enable compatability with the MRI. Lots of PEEK, and some fancy alloys I imagine.
Between this and the rat heart scientists grew from scratch this week I'm making plans to live forever.
@Klebert L. Hall:
The surgeon makes the surgical diagnosis, WHAT KIND of treatment a patient needs, puts together the operative strategy, optimizes the patient's other variables and comorbidities prior to surgery, then manages the patient in the surgical ICU post op. After that, the surgeon sees the patient for however long is necessary in clinic for followup and serves as primary physician for patients that don't have one. They're definitely docs, but with a wider range of treatment modalities at their disposal.
This robot is a glorified scalpel. The surgeon sits at the console and guides the robotic arm, and there's no AI involved at all. Who would take responsibilty if the surgery went wrong and the robot was in control? Would you really want "error code 125: Grandma is dead", or would you want a human telling you what happened and apologizing?
The average neurosurgeon makes $400,000 and works 100hr weeks. Subtract the 300,000 for insurance and overhead for their clinic, divide by 5000 for 50wks worked/yr. = $20 an hour. This is after 4yrs college, 4yrs medschool, 7 years residency working 120hrs/wk (the duty hour limits are a lie. Residents still live at the hospital and go home to sleep for 4hrs, work ~27-28 days a month) and 2 year fellowship, emerging $200k in debt. Residents start at $30,000/yr.
The AMA is a regulatory body, and makes rules for what treatment is appropriate for docs to administer. Patients can go to whichever surgeon they please, and can haggle for their treatment if they are paying out of pocket or if their insurance is structured like that. Calling what surgeons have a monopoly is like saying that your local crackdealer has a monopoly. You can either pay exactly what the first one that you encounter asks for, you could walk another block and see what the next one offers you, or you could go smoke dope instead (ie try out chemo/radiation instead of getting definitive surgical treatment for your brain tumor). Or you could manage your high blood pressure and cholesterol to minimize health risk yourself, circumventing the need for a surgeon to come in and clip your aneurysm in the first place.
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