Recent Progress in Medical Miniature Robots: From Bench to Bedside serves as a specialized and dedicated reference on tethered miniature robots and their related collective behaviors. This book presents the latest achievements in the research of miniature robotics and introduces a variety of miniature robots on the milli-/micro/nano-scale, with tethered/untethered and individual/swarm designs, describing the various types, and analyzing the underlying principles per class. Clinicians, academicians, healthcare professionals, researchers, students, engineers, and scientists working in the field of medical miniature robots and related biomedical applications will benefit from the knowledge presented in this book. Robotic technology helps the medical field realize new surgical procedures and medical treatments that are previously unachievable. Innovative technology like medical robotics have already and will further improve the performance of minimally invasive interventions, allowing more accessible surgical treatments. With the advancement of robotic technologies across the scales, novel robotic-assisted surgical procedures and therapeutic interventions are revolutionizing medical diagnosis and treatment solutions, which enable and enhance visualization, accessibility, and accuracy for surgeons to carry out minimally invasive interventions, benefiting medical doctors and patients worldwide.
Part 1: Tethered Miniature Robots
1. Flow-assisted and flow-driven microcatheters
2. Magnetically controlled continuum miniature robot: design, control, and application
3. Magnetically actuated continuum robots for vascular interventions Part 2: Untethered Miniature Robots - Individual
4. A rotating magnetic gradient field-based drive system for microagent control in targeted therapy
5. The future of microrobotics in gynecological applications for the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of Asherman Syndrome
6. Design and Fabrication of a Magnetic Actuation Miniature Soft Robot for Biological Sampling
7. Functionalization of microrobots for biomedical applications
8. Clinical imaging of miniature robots in relevant biological scenarios Part 3: Untethered Miniature Robots - Swarm
9. Magnetic microrobots from individual to microswarm steering
10. Medical microrobots for in vivo assisted reproduction
11. Untethered microrobots for minimally invasive removal of blood clots
12. Micro-/nanorobots for combating biofilm infections Part 4: Microrobotic Platform
13. Title tbd
14. In Vitro Diagnosis via micro-/nanorobotic platform
Li Zhang is a professor at the Department of Mechanical and Automation Engineering and a professor by courtesy at the Department of Surgery at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). He is a director at the SIATCUHK Joint Laboratory of Robotics and Intelligent Systems, and a group leader in the Multi-scale Medical Robotics Center (MRC), InnoHK, at the Hong Kong Science Park. Dr. Zhangs research interests include small-scale robotics and biomedical applications. He is elected as FIEEE, FRSC, FAAIA, FHKIE, a member of the Hong Kong Young Academy of Sciences, and an Outstanding Fellow of the Faculty of Engineering at CUHK. Philip Wai Yan Chiu is currently the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Shun Hing Education and Charity Fund Professor of Robotic Surgery at CUHK, and the Director of MRC and Chow Yuk Ho Technology Centre for Innovative Medicine of CUHK. He is also the Director of Endoscopy at Prince of Wales Hospital and the New Territories East Cluster of the Hong Kong Hospital Authority. His research interests include minimally invasive robotic esophagectomy, novel endoscopic technologies for the diagnosis of early GI cancers, endoscopic surgery, and robotics for endoluminal surgery. Kai Fung Chan is a research assistant professor at the Chow Yuk Ho Technology Centre for Innovative Medicine and MRC of CUHK. His research interests include medical miniature devices, micro-/nanorobotics, and translational medicine. He is also a co-founder of three start-up companies that are related to in vitro diagnostic devices, miniature medical devices, and medical microrobotic technologies.
