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A tiny robot on the space station will simulate remote-controlled surgery up there
Sean Crimmins, a senior in engineering at the University of Nebraska, loads the robotic arm into its case on Aug. 11 before a shake test.
(
Craig Chandler
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University of Nebraska Office of University Communication and Marketing
)
The robot is small in size but its aspirations are out of this world — literally.
MIRA, which stands for miniaturized in vivo robotic assistant, recently became the first surgical robot at the International Space Station.
The tiny robot, which weighs about 2 pounds, arrived at the space station on Feb. 1. Over the next few weeks, the robotic assistant will practice operating in zero gravity.
Developers plan to use MIRA to conduct a surgical simulation via remote-controlled technology, with a surgeon directing its movements 250 miles away from Nebraska.
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"The tasks mimic surgical tissue with tension that allows a dissection to be performed," a University of Nebraska release explained. The robot "will use its left arm to grasp, and its right arm to cut, much like a human surgeon in a hospital operating room."
The robot was developed by Virtual Incision Corporation, based in Lincoln, Neb. It was also made possible through a partnership between NASA and the University of Nebraska.
The space mission can potentially help pave the way for medicine in long-distance space travel, but the inventors of MIRA hope their version of robotic-assisted surgery (RAS) will make the greatest difference for health care on Earth, particularly in areas that lack access to a local surgeon.
"When we started this work at the University of Nebraska, we shared a collective vision that miniRAS could make robotic-assisted surgery available to any patient, any time, anywhere," said Shane Farritor, Virtual Incision's co-founder. "Exploring the use of miniRAS in extreme environments helps our teams understand how we can remove barriers for patients."
The goal is for MIRA to be controlled by a surgeon through a console. From there, the surgeon can direct the robot's camera and instruments inside a patient's body. MIRA's inventors say it could be game changing in rural areas and in military battlefields.
The real-world application explains MIRA's size. Virtual Incision said RAS technology tend to be big and clunky, so the company wanted to design a device that would be easy to transport, store and set up.
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Farritor and his colleagues have been developing MIRA for nearly two decades. MIRA is scheduled to return to Earth in the spring.
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