We propose a flexible artificial skin with a tactile function that requires no external power supply. The proposed skin is made from a lamination of an electret, an elastomer and two electrodes. The electret is a material in which electric charges are stored semi-permanently. In this study, an electret with a thickness of 15 μm was made by applying amorphous fluororesin on a 10 μm thick copper electrode. After that, an elastomer containing carbon black was applied to the opposite electrode with a thickness of 1.0 mm, and these were laminated to fabricated an artificial skin of about 1.1 mm. The results of experiments in which the pressure was applied to the prototype skin showed that the detected, voltage was 16 V, which was sufficient to use as a sensor for detecting the contact. Furthermore, a principle to detect the position of contact point is proposed and verified in simulation. In the future work, experiments to estimate the contact point will be carried out.

While performance and functionality are required as the quality of products, in recent years, texture and aesthetics have been attracting attention in order to differentiate products from those of other companies, and the demand for tactile design of products has been increasing. However, it takes a lot of time and money to make prototypes and conduct tactile evaluations. Therefore, it would be useful to estimate the tactile sensation from the 3D coordinates obtained from the 3D model at the design stage. In this study, we focused on the spatial frequency of the texture and investigated the effect of bandwidth variation on the subjective evaluation of roughness, with the aim of quantifying the roughness feeling based on the shape information of the texture. The results of the subjective evaluation of roughness showed that the low-frequency component of the texture may not contribute to the roughness perception.

In this paper, the authors propose a method to detect collision of the robot in paddy fields to avoid the stranding of small robot in shallow water. The proposed method is to model the acceleration of the robot by the differential equation, including the unknown collision, and estimate the time and amplitude of the collision. The extended Kalman filter is used for estimation. Two types of models in which the unknown collision is modeled by the acceleration and velocity are discussed. As the result, we understand that the time of the collision can be estimated from the time of the estimated value of the velocity-dependent collision term becomes maximum values. Furthermore, the result shows that we can decide the robot becomes stranding based on the amplitude of the estimate of the velocity-dependent collision term because the estimated value becomes large when the height of obstacle becomes large.

To support organic farmers who are struggling between strict management and daily labor on open-field cultivation which is difficult to mechanize, we focused on taking care of the growth of organic vegetables that must be treated everyday. We designed the first prototype and evaluated the supposed functions necessary for the growth.

Agricultural workers have required automatic harvesters due to aging of the Japanese recently. Spinach is one of the difficult vegetables to harvest automatically. Therefore, Shinshu University proposed a harvesting method called "passive handling". The previous works revealed that the difference in root cutting blade path resulted in a difference in harvest success rate. However, it is not known what factors make a difference in harvest success rate. In the future, it will be necessary to model the relationship between the root cutting blade and the soil in order to establish a route design method for the root cutting blade and facilitate route evaluation. In this study, we model the reaction force acting between the root cutting blade and the soil to guide future pathway formation.

This paper presents an estimation method of total harvesting time using the tomato harvesting robot developed in this study. In this robot, the occlusion ratio of obstacles to the target tomato is one of the factors for harvestability. The occlusion ratio was quantified, and the criteria for tomatoes that are easy for this robot to harvest was determined based on the results of the harvesting experiment. Using the tomato growth state map, the total harvesting time was estimated from the location data of the tomatoes that can be shipped with the occlusion ratio of 0.07 or less.

There is a need for an assistance system for farmers doing mid-back work in soil cultivation which is hard on the legs and back. In this study, we developed an electric-powered mobile cart that can detect the direction of movement desired by a passenger based on an intuitive interface with a cloth pressure distribution sensor. The sensor is placed on the seat of the mobile cart. The electric-powered mobile cart assists the side-way movement of the passenger under mid-back work. We measured the changes in the EMG of the vastus lateralis muscle during the side-way movement of the passenger assisted by the mobile cart and confirmed that the EMG of the passenger was reduced.

In Japanese agriculture, labor shortages are becoming increasingly serious due to the lack of farmers and aging. Therefore, research has been conducted on the automation of cabbage harvesting. There are problems that cabbage detection fails due to the backlight and controlling harvesting part does not work because of detecting cabbages in the back row. In order to solve these problems, we proposed new recognition methods in this paper. We worked on cabbage detection using lower half of the cabbage and cabbage selection using a depth camera. Moreover, sliding mode control was also incorporated to enable automatic harvesting in soft soil. The experimental results are shown to confirm the effectiveness of these proposed methods.

In the northern part of Tokushima Prefecture, lotus root cultivation is flourishing. However, the area is plagued with damage caused by ducks and turtles, which caused about 20 million yen in damage to lotus root in 2006. In particular, ducks act in group in the night, so the damage caused by once is large and it is difficult to take countermeasures at night. Although nets and tegus have been used as a countermeasure, the ducks themselves are often caught damage to the ducks themselves. Therefore, we focused on countermeasures using water drones. By developing a water drone equipped with a green lamp, which ducks hate, we can prevent damage to ducks. In this study, we have been developed a visual detection system by using YOLOv5, which is a machine learning algorithm for the image recognition. Some experimental results show our system is effective to detect duck in the lotus root farm.

Recently, aging and the labor shortage of the agriculture employee progress in Japan. Therefore, new machines and robots for harvesting are required. In this paper, we propose a method of automated harvesting fruit such as apples by redundant manipulator which consists of 6-DOF manipulator and sliding mechanism. This redundant manipulator enables to harvest fruit in larger area by sliding mechanism moving when the robot arm does not reach the fruits. From the experimental results, the robot could harvest and receive a fruit in 21.2 seconds with the new algorithm for harvesting fruit based on redundancy of the robot arms. Also, more than 70% of fruits were harvested.

The purpose of this research is to automate the harvesting of pears and apples on V shaped joint trees using a fruit harvesting robot. For harvesting by the fruit harvesting robot, the position of the harvesting target is first detected three-dimensionally using RGB-D cameras, and the final harvesting position of the end effector is obtained. However, there is a problem that the point cloud obtained by the RGB-D camera becomes very inaccurate in the outdoor environment. Therefore, in this research, we propose an effective detection method of the fruit by using not only the 3D information obtained from the RGB-D camera but also the 2D image and camera information. Furthermore, in this study, we also report a method for determining the ripeness of pears using information on fruit detection.

The purpose of this study is to develop an assistive device with crawler moving mechanism in order to reduce the burden on the grape growers. The assistive device is mounted to a mobile robot by a flexible arm and consisted a linkage mechanism in order to use a single linear actuator. This device assists in the flexion and extension of the shoulder joint, elbow joint, and wrist joint. The effectiveness of the proposed assistive device is verified by the result of the experiments.

In this research, we develop an autonomous mowing robot in orchards using high-precision GNSS and a ROS architecture. The robot is equipped with two crawlers, a GNSS module and an antenna, and a 3D-LiDAR. As a high-precision GNSS, Network-RTK-GNSS and CLAS by Quasi-Zenith Satellite System, Michibiki, can be chosen depending on the situation. We investigate the positioning performance of Network-RTK-GNSS in some orchards including outdoor plantations and plastic greenhouses. Some demonstrations in outdoor environments including fallow fields were conducted by the developed autonomous mowing robot.

Recently, the declining and aging of farmers in Japan has become more serious year by year. Development of agricultural robots for labor saving and high efficiency in agriculture is underway, but the development of agricultural robots for fruit tree cultivation is delayed due to the diversity of cultivation methods. In this research, we realize autonomous driving of UGV（Unmanned Ground Vehicle）in orchard of V-shaped joint tree. In order to build a low-cost and versatile system, this paper proposes self-localization methods with RGB-D cameras without artificial landmarks. Traveling along the fruit tree row is realized by local self-localization based on the position information of the fruit tree. When turning on headland, the self-localization is realized by the EKF (Extended Kalman Filter) using map matching. The usefulness of this methods is verified by field experiments.

This paper describes evaluation of assistive effect of the Semi-Crouching Assist Device based on posture and assist force information during agricultural work. The Semi-Crouching Assistive Device generates assist force by the rubber-less artificial muscle. We propose a method of evaluating the assisted effect of assist devices other than the method based on EMG. In this method, we estimate the compressive force of the intervertebral disc from the actual assist force and work posture data during agricultural work. From the estimation results, it was found that the assist device under development has the effect of exerting an assist effect in actual farm work and reducing the compressive force of the intervertebral disc.

Vineyards which are situated in remote mountainous areas receive weak GPS signals. Mobile robots working in such vineyards needs special algorithms to navigate without using GPS information. In this paper, we propose an algorithm of autonomous mobile robot navigation which uses only the local features of the vineyard. The algorithm only uses data from laser range sensor to accurately detect pillars supporting the grape plants in the presence of noise. Robust detection of these landmarks is important for the autonomous navigation of robot in vineyards. The detected pillars are also used for accurate localization and mapping. We also present an algorithm for smooth obstacle avoidance in vineyard for dynamic obstacles like moving people. Experiments in both simulation and actual vineyard fields are presented.

We have developed a flapping UAV equipped with a thrust vectoring mechanism that controls the flight attitude by deflecting the flapping thrust by tilting the left and right wings independently around the Pitch axis. The developed aircraft is capable of controlling the flight attitude of the three axes of Pitch, Roll, and Yaw, and potentially has abilities to perform various flights such as sharp turns and rotations. The hovering flight has been successfully stabilized by developing PID controller for the Pitch and Roll control.

Recently, a fixed pitch propeller is generally used for a small type electric unmanned aerial vehicle with fixed wings and unmanned Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL) in general. On the other hand, when a variable pitch propeller can be applied, propulsion performance is greatly improved, it can be expected that flight performance such as cruise will be greatly improved. However, at present, there are problems in miniaturizing and lightening of the mechanism using the variable pitch propeller, and it cannot generally be used. Therefore, in this research we aim to develop design technologies to overcome these problems. As an immediate goal, it is assumed to be applied in an electric Quad Tilt Wing VTOL (weights 25 kg) which is subjecting research and development in Shizuoka prefecture and JAXA. Weight reduction design of prototype and bench performance evaluation of the new prototype attached to a wing have been carried out. In this paper, we will investigate the weight reduction of the variable pitch propeller mechanism by using CFRP, and visualized the variable pitch operation while the variable pitch propeller is rotating.

Conventional unmanned helicopters equip stabilizer-bar on the rotor system, and it is effective to slow the gust response of the unmanned helicopter. However, the stabilizer-bar has brought about an increase in complexity and inefficiency. To achieve energy efficiency and simplify the mechanism, it is necessary to remove the stabilizer bar. The problem with a stabilizer-less helicopter is that the off-axis response causes difficulty in control. In addition, robustness to changes in the total mass and moment of inertia during flight is also important. In this paper, attitude control of the stabilizer-less industrial unmanned helicopter based on sliding mode control was proposed. The reason for using sliding mode control is its high robustness to uncertainties. From the simulation results, we verified that the system was robust to the uncertainties in the total mass and moment of inertia.

This paper addresses the problem of cooperative aerial transportation of a payload using a team of Multi-rotor UAVs. In recent years, Multi-rotor UAVs have been used in various fields. Among them, what is expected to be particularly active is the delivery of packages in the field of logistics. In this field, there are some experimental examples of delivery using Multi-rotor UAVs but they were only used solely. Using multiple UAVs in delivery may increase the load capacity or the size of the payload. For that purpose, we consider a cooperative transportation system using multiple Multi-rotor UAVs. We simulate the control method of this system based on the theory of Cable-Driven Parallel Robot (CDPR) using MATLAB. From the simulation results, we study that this method can control the position and the orientation of the payload independently, and considering the centripetal acceleration term of payload improves the control performance.

In recent years, multi-rotor helicopter has been used in various fields. However, it has the disadvantages. A general multi-rotor helicopter needs to change its attitude when moving horizontally. Therefore, fluctuations in the attitude of the aircraft to counter disturbances pose a risk of contact with structures when approaching a structure in infrastructure inspection. Furthermore, in contact work, it is required to independently control translational motion and rotational motion, such as maintaining the position of the aircraft while maintaining an arbitrary attitude. Based on the above background, the study is being conducted on a non-planar multi-rotor helicopter in which translational motion and rotational motion can be controlled independently. In this study, in order to establish the optimum design of the airframe specialized in the arbitrary axial direction, an evaluation index called ”Force capacity” is applied to the non-planar multi-rotor helicopter, and the attitude of each rotor is optimized.

We have developed an amphibious tiltrotor multicopter and verified its performance. As the result, it was found that wireless communication with the ground was interrupted at a water depth of over 3 m. In this research, we install a communication buoy on the airframe, extend the communication cable, and examine underwater maneuvering by wired communication. The purpose of this research is to develop a communication system that enables the operation of amphibious multicopter in deeper water.

In this paper, a drone is controlled so as to track a yellow ball based on the image taken by the camera on the drone. In particular, its vertical and lateral control is made so that the position of the ball is kept at the center of the camera image. Its longitudinal control is made so that the size of the ball is kept constant in the camera image. It is also reported that the control delay differs dependent on the control direction and that it can be problematic to use the size of the ball image for control.

frequencies of left and right wings independently. In the present study, we identified a mathematical model of the thrust generation through a series of experiments using the actual aircraft, aiming at the development a flight control system. The input is taken as the duty ratio of the PWM signal to the motor, and the output is the thrust from the flapping wing. We conducted a flight simulation by using the identified model to investigate the reproducibility of the airspeed of the UAV in the hovering flight mode, where the degree of freedom of the aircraft is restricted in a vertical axis.

We proposed a long-reach lightweight articulated arm "Hiryu-III" using weight-compensation with thrusters and a wire-pulley system. The robot developed in this study equipped with two thrusters for weight-compensation and pitch axis motion control in each joint. The previous study, Hiryu-II, had the disadvantage of low rigidity around the roll axis. To solve this problem, we propose a method using wire-pulley system in a single pipe, which is equivalent to a parallel link mechanism. Based on the above consideration, we fabricated a robot and conducted a motion experiment. As a result, the robot was successfully operated with two links, however the vibration occurs at landing. This was caused by the low rigidity of the pitch axis, and it is considered that the main factor of this problem is the elastic deformation of the keyway of the tensioner of the wire-pulley system.

The purpose of this research is to develop a night surveillance robot which is able to substitute the human guards in a huge area such as a campus, a park, etc. In this paper, the night surveillance robot, ”Aerial Ubiquitous Display”, which is able to fly and solve the problems of conventional surveillance robots, is introduced and its human approaching methods are verified. Experiments were performed with various parameters including velocity, altitude and time.

In recent years, the demand for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) has increased in various fields such as spraying of agricultural chemicals, inspection of tunnels and bridges and transportation etc., so that they are expected to play an active role in other industrial applications. However, quadrotors that are currently in widespread use are underactuated system, making it difficult to control their arbitrary posture and position. Therefore, it is aimed at realizing free movement with free posture by making the UAVs be fully actuated system so that it can be used in narrow spaces. In addition, in some conventional studies, motion control in extreme postures has not been considered. In this study, the attitude of the UAV approaches up to near the singular point through simulations, and then its motion is controlled while keeping the attitude including such a point. Some problems in the control near the singular point are pointed out, and an improvement method is proposed.

Most flapping-wing robots use a single motor to flap both wings. Independent wing control has the potential to improve maneuverability. However, this approach tends to increase the weight and makes it difficult to take off. We developed a lightweight servo motor and a flapping-wing robot with independently controllable wings. We conducted a vertical takeoff experiment and confirmed that the robot had the capability to take off without the need of a launcher.

Fault-tolerant control (FTC) is known as a typical example of fail-safe systems applied to unmanned aerial vehicles. The feasibility of reconfiguring the control systems by FTC is highly dependent on the structural controllability of the systems. In this study, the structural controllability of octo-copters with multiple failed rotors is expressed as general equations. For this objective, the conditions for input-connectivity and for structured rank, which are necessary conditions for systems to be structural controllable, are formulated. Then, it becomes clear that the condition for the systems to be input-connectable subsumes the condition on structured rank. Furthermore, it can be confirmed that there exist faults for which the control systems can be reconfigured while satisfying the formulated conditions.

Wing-in-ground (WIG) effect vehicles are airplanes that use the ground effect to fly at altitudes of tens of centimeters to several meters above the ground or water surface. By using such an effect, it is possible to fly with less energy than a normal aircraft, so that by using this, it is possible to load much more luggage than an aircraft and cruise at a higher speed than a ship. Thus, this transport equipment has the characteristics of both aircraft and ships, and can make up for the shortcomings of them. But, takeoff is thought to be an issue for ground effect vehicles. The wing cannot generate sufficient lift when not increasing the airspeed, so that it needs to accelerate during a long distance before takeoff. In this research, such a problem is improved by introducing four variable tiltable rotor mechanisms. In this paper, a model that considers the thrusts due to such tiltable rotors is derived, together with including the ground effect of the vehicle, and its effectiveness is verified by a simulation.

Robotic manipulators using thrusters for weight compensation are an active research topic due to their potential to exceed the limits of maximum length. Due to the constraints of the cubic-square law, the structure of large manipulators must be flexible, making hardware development a very difficult issue. This paper focuses on overcoming these problems by installing inertial measurement units and microcontrollers in each unit to control thrusters locally and suppress torsional deformation around roll axis of the manipulator. As a means of realizing such a manipulator, we adopted the mechanism of Hiryu-II, which was previously developed by our research group. The prototype which is 9.3-m-long with 6 DOF was controlled its joint positions and the prototype which is 12.4-m-long with 8 DOF was floated successfully. These results surpassed the maximum length of the manipulator achieved by previous studies.

A quadrotor UAV equipped with dual-axis tilting mechanisms has been developed as an advanced type of a quadrotor UAV, enabling independent control of position and attitude, and flight in arbitrary attitudes without thrust energy loss. The developed UAV is called a dual-axis tilting quadrotor UAV in this paper. In the previous research, arbitrary attitude flight with manual position control has been achieved. This paper describes autonomous position control of the dual-axis tilting quadrotor UAV and demonstrates it with numerical simulation and flight experiments.

In this research, we design and develop a large-sized flapping flight robot with a large payload toward practical application of flapping robots. The wingspan of the designed robot is 6m, which is based of the world largest avians that once lived. We designed mechanism to realize the flapping motion of a large-sized flapping robot, manufactured the designed robot, and measured the generated forces. We considered the feasibility of a large-sized flapping flight robot.

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women, and early detection by screening is important. The screening involves ultrasonic and MRI. The MRI and ultrasonic combination are a technology called fusion imaging that has been already on the market. The two types of exams require a patient’s prone and supine positions during which the breast deforms due to gravity. As a result, it is difficult to combine the information of the MRI and the ultrasound image into one image. This study conducts deformation analysis based on their own weight by moving particle semi-implicit (MPS) method using a model with a non-uniform elastic modulus. In particular, the comparison of MPS and FEM deformation analyses with a diameter of 40mm hemisphere model is made to validate the MPS. Furthermore, the large deformation analysis with a diameter of 100mm hemisphere model is carried out to clarify the characteristics of a non-linear deformation.

We are aiming to achieve a real-time force-feedback for high quality of tele-existence with high performance torque controllable devices, Twin-driven MR Fluid Actuator (TD-MRA). Therefore, this study focuses on the haptic interface for the remotely controllable endoscopic surgery. We proposed an original mechanism that performs pivot motions and insertion of the forceps. This device, the MR Haptic Device for Endoscopic Surgery (H-MRD for ES), used two sets of the TD-MRA for rolling and pitching rotation and two MR fluid brakes for insertion and grasping. In this paper, we describe the development of its test environment. The Single Arm Robot for Endoscopic Surgery (SAR for ES) were newly developed with composing of a 7 DOF robot arm, a six-axis force-moment sensor and an original robot forceps. The H-MRD for ES and the SAR for ES were connected in the same LAN environment with TCP/IP protocol and constructed as a bilateral control system.

The paper focuses on numerical simulation for an artificial bio-tissue touch-type haptic interface for a VR palpation training system. The particle method is based on Koshizuka’s MPS method (Moving Particle Semi-implicit). We newly apply the method to a non-uniform stiffness elastic model. It is clarified that the adequacy and accuracy of the particle method for small (linear) and large (non-linear) deformation for palpation. Its characteristics of small and large deformations are made clear through FEM commercial software (SolidWorks) and experimental results, respectively. The displacement and von Mises stress on the palpation surface by the particle method are agree with the results by FEM in small deformation case. The comparison of the deformation at the center on palpation surface between the particle method and experimental result is shown. As the result, the maximum difference is 2 mm. It shows the improved thing, however the particle method can analyze the large deformation robustly.

The purpose of this study was to extract the bone surface from ultrasound images by a technique called semantic segmentation, which is a type of deep learning, and to verify the effectiveness of its accuracy. A neural network model called U-Net was used for learning, and the data used for learning was an echo movie of the bone surface divided into 300 images. These 300 ultrasound images were divided into training data and test data. Although the accuracy can be expressed numerically as a similarity rate when learning, we cannot achieve 100% accuracy by machine learning at present. Therefore, how accurate is sufficient depends on the field and application. Therefore, in this study, we investigated how the learning accuracy can be evaluated after extracting the bone surface by semantic segmentation. As a result of learning, extraction was successful with an accuracy of 67 %. In addition, in order to confirm its effectiveness, it was verified whether or not the center point at a certain X coordinate of the bone surface portion in the original ultrasound image was output in the predicted image. As a result, we succeeded in confirming the effectiveness of the accuracy by confirming that it was output.

In this research, we propose the method for improving the accuracy of feature-based SLAM. Unnecessary feature points that SLAM uses for mapping are removed by discrimination by a neural network system. Our neural network system was trained by the coordinates and pixel values of the feature points as feature vectors and outputs a feature point in a surgical image is a biological part or a surgical instrument part. Feature points of surgical instruments may cause noise in SLAM, and the elimination of these feature points is expected to improve the accuracy of SLAM. The experimental results showed our neural network system was able to discriminate the feature points with high accuracy in the validation images, which is the same scene as the training images.

In this research, we propose the method for improving the accuracy of feature-based SLAM. Instead of giving images directly to SLAM, partly blurred images to eliminate unnecessary feature points that could influence the accuracy of SLAM are given. To generate partly blurred images, we employ Semantic Segmentation that generates binary mask images to separate biological objects and surgical tools. By performing the image blur process only in the region of surgical tools, we eliminate feature points on the surgical tools that impair the accuracy of SLAM. We conducted preliminary experiments and confirmed our proposed method worked well in some situations.

The movement of cerebrospinal fluid in the spinal canal is a reciprocating flow field caused by heartbeat and respiration, but the process of mass transport by the flow and the changes in dynamics associated with diseases have not been fully investigated. In this study, a simple CSF flow phantom with a double circular tube shape was fabricated to fit into a skeletal model, and the reciprocating flow was observed. The moving water mass image showed the characteristics of the Hagen-Poiseuille flow through a double circular tube. The amplitude of the oscillation of the flow in the phantom was large upstream and small downstream. This characteristic is similar to that observed in the human body.

By integrating locally operated surgical assistant robots in a sterilized area, a surgeon can perform safe and accurate robotically assisted laparoscopic solo surgery. A new locally operated forceps manipulator that can be used by the surgeon as a third arm during laparoscopic surgery was developed. A new 3-DOFs forceps manipulator consists of the gimbal pitch axis, a rack gear and gear train for the RCM yaw axis, a belt and pulleys for the insertion axis attached to the commercial forceps. The dimensions of the manipulator are width 130 mm * depth 360 mm * height 360 mm. The weight is 2.1 kg. The positional accuracy of the new RSM mechanism was evaluated.

In this paper, we show the two types stabilizer for off-pump coronary artery bypass grafting. One has no rubber flow channel, and the other has one. The both stabilizers have the valves that open when they contact with heart. The flow channel of former is stainless tube with suction hole. The structure of former is simple, but the thickness is thin because the stainless tube is under the valve element. On the other hand, the thickness of latter is thin, since the stainless tube is side of suction cups. However, the latter has the narrow flow channels which are difficult to form the rubber suction cups.

By integrating locally operated small surgical robots in a sterilized area, a surgeon can perform safe and accurate robotically assisted laparoscopic partial nephrectomy. A new locally operated forceps manipulator that can be used by the surgeon as a third arm during laparoscopic surgery was developed. The DC motor driven 3-DOFs forceps manipulator consists of a gimbal-mounted parallel linkage mechanism for the pitch and the yaw axes, and a belt-pulley mechanism for the insertion axis attached to the commercial forceps. The dimensions of the manipulator are 180 mm * 270 mm * 300 mm. The weight is 1.7 kg. The positional accuracy and the mechanical deflection of the manipulator were evaluated.

A new tele-operated manipulator for laparoscopic surgery performed by a surgeon in a sterilized area was developed. The manipulator system consists of a handy leader device and a forceps follower manipulator LODEM as the third arm. We propose the 5DOFs intra-abdominal type operating device with gimbals for the pitch and yaw axes, twin linear guides for the insertion axis, a free rotation for the roll axis, and a pinch for the grasp axis. The dimensions of the device are 100 mm × 180 mm × 220 mm, and its math is 450 g. The maximum mechanical backlash was measured. The crank-slider mobile LODEM is unilateral leader-follower controlled by the leader device. The leader-follower manipulator was confirmed.

Assistive technology using robots can realize high-precision fine needle aspiration cytology, and it may be possible to perform diagnosis even for deep lesions that were difficult to perform until now. In this paper, as a needle control method to improve the sample collection amount in fine needle aspiration cytology by a robot using a 25G extra fine needle, we proposed method that combined the reciprocating movement of the needle and changing the puncture route by utilizing the asymmetry of the puncture reaction forces due to the bevel shape of needle tip. As a result of the evaluation test, the suction sampling using the proposed method with a 25G extra fine needle obtained the same amount of sampling as the doctor’s procedure using a 22G needle, suggesting the effectiveness of the proposed method.

The etiology of the three-dimensional bone deformity of ankle osteoarthritis is not enough elucidated. The purpose of this study was to evaluate that alignment of the tibia on ankle osteoarthritis individuals was responsible for the three-dimensional bone deformity using finite element method. The alignment of the tibia was calculated using a globally optimal iterative closest point algorithm, and the load direction depended on the alignment of the tibia. Finite element method results showed the tensile surface force on the edge of anterior tibial plafond of ankle osteoarthritis. This study suggests that the relative positional difference between normal and ankle osteoarthritis affect the three-dimensional deformity.

Nowadays, the demand of automatic surgery is increasing because of spread of COVID-19. However currently it is diagnosed and operated by past cases and physician’s judgment. In this study, we’ve developed micro forceps for surgical robot that is able to palpate and operate. In this paper, we focus on about method of displacement measurement for grasped object by micro forceps. We have improved that it can inform us when the object starts to deform.

In this paper, a laparoscopic surgical robot equipped with a new palpation system which can identify the location of an imitation tumor under use of a trocar was developed based on our previous studies. In robotic surgery, when palpation is performed under use of the trocar, it is difficult to realize haptic or tactile sense of the contacted object because the forceps is affected by the trocar. Therefore, suppression of an influence of the trocar on the forceps was attempted by using the Neural Network. In order to verify an effectiveness of the developed palpation system, location identification experiments were carried out, in which identification of the imitation tumor location was attempted for 4 kinds of sample with each different tumor location. The results showed the effectiveness of the neural network, and an error of identification of the imitation tumor location was less than 1mm.

The stabilizer is used for Off-pump coronary artery bypass grafting. This surgical instrument has the rubber suckers, variable stiffness arm and fixed part. When one of suckers has been peeled off, the adhesion force of stabilizer was decreased, because the suckers was connected by stainless tube. We proposed the stabilizer with valves opened when the sucker is contacted on the heart. Previous study has shown that rubber type stabilizer was fabricated. In this paper, we show the vibration reduction effect of the stabilizer with valves using the cardiac pulsation type coronary anastomosis training system. When the fabricated stabilizer, the reduction ratio of displacement was 0.19. On the other hand, the ratio was 0.13 when the surgical instrument.

The IoRT (Internet of Robotic Things) system is a “system of systems” consisting of multiple layers such as robots, cloud, and networks. In most cases, separate solutions are used for each elemental system. On the other hand, the ZeroMQ messaging middleware enables us to develop each elemental system in an IoRT system comprehensively with a single solution. This is because ZeroMQ has transports for each layer of the IoRT system, and supports bi-directional communication over the Internet while being peer-to-peer. Furthermore, by integrating our ZeroMQ communication modules into OpenRTM-aist, Message Broker-style messaging is also able to be performed. In this way, the ZeroMQ communication interface will contribute to the formation of more diverse message flows in IoRT systems.