Autonomous Robot Surgeon Bests Humans in World First

In a robotic surgery breakthrough, a bot stitched up a pig's small intestines using its own vision, tools, and intelligence to carry out the procedure. What's more, the Smart Tissue Autonomous Robot (STAR) did a better job on the operation than human surgeons who were given the same task. STAR's inventors don't claim that robots can replace humans in the operating room anytime soon. Instead they see the accomplishment as a proof of concept--both for the specific technologies used and for the general concept of "supervised autonomy" in the OR. Pediatric surgeon Peter Kim, one of the researchers, didn't sound threatened when he spoke to reporters in a press call yesterday.