Distributed Control Architecture for Automated Surgical Task Execution with Coordinated Robot Arms

The paper describes a robot control and coordination framework for the automation of surgical tasks. In the proposed framework, surgeons are supported by autonomous robotic assistants and do not teleoperate robots, unless in case of exceptions in the tasks of the robots. Such robots perform basic surgical actions by combining sensing, dexterity and cognitive capabilities. The goal is achieved thanks to rigorous assessment of surgical requirements, formal specification of robotic system behavior, including multiple arm coordination and human/system interaction, and control software development with state-of-the-art component- based technologies. The paper presents an experimental setup composed of two robots operating on a US-compatible phantom, demonstrating the feasibility of the approach.