Image-guided robotic navigation system for neurosurgery

This paper presents an image-guided robotic navigation system for neurosurg ery, which can be applied to the electro-stimulation treatment of Parkinson 's leisure, the biopsy of deep tumors, and haematoma evacuation. The system integrates a computer containing CT images for surgical planning, a magnet ic tracking device for measuring the coordinates of the markers and surgica l instruments, and a robot manipulator for guiding surgical instruments to the preplanned position and orientation. The computer display of brain anat omy offers a convenient tool for surgeons to diagnose brain diseases and to plan safe surgical paths, while the tracking device guides the robot manip ulator to automatically move surgical instruments to the preplanned positio n and orientation. An experiment of using a skull model for simulating a ro botic biopsy of brain tumor has been done to verify the performance of the robotic navigation system. The results show that the positioning accuracy o f the robot relative to the tracker frame is only related to the positionin g resolution of the robot manipulator and the positioning accuracy of the t racking device. In other words, the positioning accuracy of the robot manip ulator does not affect the final positioning accuracy of the surgical instr uments. Therefore, using a robot manipulator for precise surgical navigatio n is feasible and reliable.