In Percutaneous Delivery Devices (Task 2.4), the BWH open MRI robot has received clinical trial approval for prostate. A Biomedical Research Partnership (BRP) proposal is pending to unite MRI-guided prostate intervention activities under a modest center grant. The research plan also includes the development of a transperineal prostate delivery system to be used in closed high-field MRI scanners, an activity that connects with the deliverables from Dr. Stoianovicis R21/R33 grant.
One of our strategic goals is steerable needle driving, using nonholonomic kinematics, control, and path planning to steer an appropriately designed needle through flexible tissue to reach a specified 3D target. We have completed the first step towards active needle steering: design and experimental validation of a nonholonomic model for bending needles with bevel tips. This work is supported by an NIH R21 grant, and a continuation RO1 is in writing.

Year 7 continued to be a success in our intracavity robot development activity, our MRI-compatible transrectal prostate intervention robot system has been performing multiple clinical trials a new trial is in the approval process.

In surgical device navigation and registration research, we developed the family of advanced numerical methods that we deployed in several pre-clinical experiments. The algorithms performed promisingly on incomplete data and were invariant to the actual geometrical arrangement of the registration fixtures. These results are included in recent NIH grant proposals on MRI-guided interventions. There is also funding for this research from a joint grant with Acoustic MedSystems on registration of C-arm fluoroscopy and transrectal ultrasound, toward optimal image guidance of prostate brachytherapy.

In the area of needle-tissue interaction, we have developed an experimental methodology for defining and validating models that predict soft tissue deformation during needle insertion. Our setup includes hardware and software for recording and measuring the time-dependent, 3D deformation that occurs as a needle is inserted into soft material. This experimental testbed, which is supported by Whitaker and supplemental NSF sources, will also provide important measurement data to initialize statistical biomechanical models developed by Dr. Davatzikos in Task 2.3.