- I'm Jason Maderer.
Professor Jaydev Desai is
in the Wallace H. Coulter
Department of Biomedical Engineering.
This is a partnership
that we have with Emory.
We're going to walk through your lab
and look at four projects.
This one is about breast cancer, right?
- Yes, so in this case
we are essentially trying
to determine if there are
changes in the breast tissue
between normal and
cancerous breast tissue.
And here, for example, we
have this small breast tissue
course and we want to figure
out if there are changes
in the electrical mechanical
properties of these
breast tissues as they
progress for normal to
cancerous tissue.
And this is pretty much a big setup here
and what we are going for
now is trying to develop
a portable desktop diagnostic device.
- Something very small.
- Something very small exactly.
So here we can put sort
of a breast tissue chunk
at the center.
We have a micro heater,
so now in addition to
the electrical and mechanical properties
we can actually even figure
out if there are changes
in the thermo properties.
And our studies have shown
that there are changes
between normal and
cancerous breast tissue.
- The second project, and these are all
medical robotics projects.
This is about a brain
and brain tumors, right?
- Right, so currently,
for example, in surgery
you can operate in the line of sight
and essentially you can
operate what you see.
And what we are trying
to do is to essentially
have the capability where you can operate
out of the line of sight.
So, for example, if you
introduce the robot inside,
and then this robot as you
can see here, it's bent,
and it's moving, so
you can essentially get
to the entire tumor and
use the MR image feedback,
magnetic resonance imaging,
and be able to do the whole thing
with much more dexterity than
what is currently possible.
- So send a robot into
the brain that is able to
sweep from side to side
to have more flexibility.
- Right, and it is 3D printed,
so this can be patient specific
and you can actually 3D print a robot.
- This is for brain hemorrhage.
But again, a robotic device
that goes into the brain
that is very flexible.
- Right, so as you can
see here, he is going to
position this for accurate
insertion point into the brain.
And now he's advancing the robot inside.
And once you're inside,
you can now pretty much,
this robot has the ability
to have the rolled joint
motion capability and
a tip that it can bend
and be able to remove the
hemorrhage that is there inside.
- We're going to move
onto the fourth project,
but let's be clear,
surgeons aren't using robots
like that in these ways.
- Not for hemorrhage
vacation, that's right.
- So this one is a very flexible project
because it has a variety of applications.
But it's a steerable
guide wire, is that right?
- Yes, as an example, if a
patient has peripheral arterial
disease and there is a
blockage, say for example,
on this side,
the clinician has to
introduce a guide wire
from this side, go over the
arch, and then come down.
So as you can see here,
which is almost to scale
from a human anatomical
model, you can see that it is
sort of a torturous pathway.
- A lot of twists and turns.
- That's right, that the
guide wire has to go through.
And what we're interested
in, essentially, is trying
to develop a technology
where you can steer the end
of the guide wire,
because, as you can see,
if you're trying to get a
guide wire through a blockage
and it comes here, there's
no way to get around it.
So you want to be able to steer it,
get around the blockage.
And this is just a very
simple illustration here
that you can just pull this
and, as you can see here,
you can see this guide wire prototype,
though not the guide wire used in clinic,
but it is to scale to
demonstrate that concept.
And the applications of
something like this are huge.
It can not only work in
the peripheral arterial
disease case, but it can
now actually apply to
to neurosurgery as well
as pretty much anything
where you have a long, flexible device,
and you need to be able to steer it.
- Great, those are four
projects from Jaydev Desai's
RoboMed Lab and you can find
more at robomed.gatech.edu.
