Atrial fibrillation (AF) increases the risk of thromboembolic events due to impaired function of the left atrial appendage (LAA). Left atrial appendage closure (LAAC) is a minimally invasive intervention designed to reduce stroke risk by sealing the LAA with an expandable occluder device. Current deployment relies on manual catheter control and imaging modalities like fluoroscopy and transesophageal echocardiography, which carry limitations including radiation exposure and limited positioning precision. In this study, we leverage a previously developed force-sensing delivery sheath integrating fiber Bragg gratings (FBGs) at the interface between the catheter and the occluder. Combined with electromagnetic (EM) tracking, this setup enables real-time measurement of interaction forces and catheter tip position during robot-assisted LAAC deployment in an anatomical phantom. We present a novel force-displacement profiling method that characterizes occluder deployment dynamics and identifies key procedural steps without relying on ionizing radiation. The force profiles reveal low-magnitude interaction forces, suggesting minimal mechanical stress on the surrounding anatomy. This approach shows promise in providing clinicians with enhanced intraoperative feedback, improving deployment outcome. Future work will focus on automating deployment steps classification and validating the sensing strategy in dynamic, realistic environments.

Abstract--Transcatheter valve repair presents significant challenges due to the mechanical limitations and steep learning curve associated with manual catheter systems. This paper investigates the use of robotics to facilitate transcatheter procedures in the context of mitral valve edge-to-edge repair . The complex handle-based control of a clinical repair device is replaced by intuitive robotic joint-based control via a game controller . Manual versus robotic performance is analyzed by decomposing the overall device delivery task into motion-specific steps and comparing capabilities on a step-by-step basis in a phantom model of the heart and vasculature. Metrics include procedure duration and clip placement accuracy. Results demonstrate that the robotic system can reduce procedural time and motion errors while also improving accuracy of clip placement. These findings suggest that robotic assistance can address key limitations of manual systems, offering a more reliable and user-friendly platform for complex transcatheter procedures. Transcatheter valve repair procedures are complex to perform and involve substantial learning curves. For example, in transcatheter edge-to-edge repair (TEER) of mitral regurgitation (Figure 1), clinical experience demonstrates that operators improve significantly over their first 50 cases and their performance continues to improve out to their 200th case [1]. A major component of mastering a transcatheter procedure is learning how to precisely control catheter positioning.

--Robotic dressing assistance has the potential to improve the quality of life for individuals with limited mobility. Existing solutions predominantly rely on rigid robotic manipulators, which have challenges in handling deformable garments and ensuring safe physical interaction with the human body. Prior robotic dressing methods require excessive operation times, complex control strategies, and constrained user postures, limiting their practicality and adaptability. This paper proposes a novel soft robotic dressing system, the Self-Wearing Adaptive Garment (SW AG), which uses an unfurling and growth mechanism to facilitate autonomous dressing. Unlike traditional approaches, the SW AG conforms to the human body through an unfurling-based deployment method, eliminating skin-garment friction and enabling a safer and more efficient dressing process. We present the working principles of the SW AG, introduce its design and fabrication, and demonstrate its performance in dressing assistance. The proposed system demonstrates effective garment application across various garment configurations, presenting a promising alternative to conventional robotic dressing assistance. RESSING is a fundamental activity of daily living that directly impacts independence and quality of life. For individuals with physical disabilities, the elderly, and those recovering from injuries, dressing can be a significant challenge [1]. The inability to dress independently often leads to a loss of autonomy, increased reliance on caregivers, and a diminished sense of dignity.

This paper introduces a novel magnetic navigation system for cardiac ablation. The system is formed from two key elements: a magnetic ablation catheter consisting of a chain of spherical permanent magnets; and an actuation system comprised of two cart-mounted permanent magnets undergoing pure rotation. The catheter design enables a large magnetic content with the goal of minimizing the footprint of the actuation system for easier integration with the clinical workflow. We present a quasi-static model of the catheter, the design of the actuation units, and their control modalities. Experimental validation shows that we can use small rotating magnets (119mm diameter) to reach cardiac ablation targets while generating clinically-relevant forces. Catheter control using a joystick is compared with manual catheter control. blue While total task completion time is similar, smoother navigation is observed using the proposed robotic system. We also demonstrate that the ball chain can ablate heart tissue and generate lesions comparable to the current clinical ablation catheters.

Robotic arms built from stiffness-adjustable, continuously bending segments serially connected with revolute joints have the ability to change their mechanical architecture and workspace, thus allowing high flexibility and adaptation to different tasks with less than six degrees of freedom, a concept that we call malleable robots. Known stiffening mechanisms may be used to implement suitable links for these novel robotic manipulators; however, these solutions usually show a reduced performance when bending due to structural deformation. By including an inner support structure this deformation can be minimised, resulting in an increased stiffening performance. This paper presents a new multi-material spine-inspired flexible structure for providing support in stiffness-controllable layer-jamming-based robotic links of large diameter. The proposed spine mechanism is highly movable with type and range of motions that match those of a robotic link using solely layer jamming, whilst maintaining a hollow and light structure. The mechanics and design of the flexible spine are explored, and a prototype of a link utilising it is developed and compared with limb segments based on granular jamming and layer jamming without support structure. Results of experiments verify the advantages of the proposed design, demonstrating that it maintains a constant central diameter across bending angles and presents an improvement of more than 203% of resisting force at 180 degrees.

Atrial fibrillation (AF) and ventricular tachycardia (VT) are two of the sustained arrhythmias that significantly affect the quality of life of patients. Treatment of AF and VT often requires radiofrequency ablation of heart tissues using an ablation catheter. Recent progress in ablation therapy leverages magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for higher contrast visual feedback, and additionally utilizes a guiding sheath with an actively deflectable tip to improve the dexterity of the catheter inside the heart. This paper presents the design and validation of an MR-conditional robotic module for automated actuation of both the ablation catheter and the sheath. The robotic module features a compact design for improved accessibility inside the MR scanner bore and is driven by piezoelectric motors to ensure MR-conditionality. The combined catheter-sheath mechanism is essentially a concentric tendon-driven continuum robot and its kinematics is modeled by the constant curvature model for closed-loop position control. Path following experiments were conducted to validate the actuation module and control scheme, achieving < 2 mm average tip position error.

The McKibben pneumatic artificial muscle is a commonly studied soft robotic actuator, and its quasistatic force-length properties have been well characterized and modeled. However, its damping and force-velocity properties are less well studied. Understanding these properties will allow for more robust dynamic modeling of soft robotic systems. The force-velocity response of these actuators is of particular interest because these actuators are often used as hardware models of skeletal muscles for bioinspired robots, and this force-velocity relationship is fundamental to muscle physiology. In this work, we investigated the force-velocity response of McKibben actuators and the ability to tune this response through the use of viscoelastic polymer sheaths. These viscoelastic McKibben actuators (VMAs) were characterized using iso-velocity experiments inspired by skeletal muscle physiology tests. A simplified 1D model of the actuators was developed to connect the shape of the force-velocity curve to the material parameters of the actuator and sheaths. Using these viscoelastic materials, we were able to modulate the shape and magnitude of the actuators' force-velocity curves, and using the developed model, these changes were connected back to the material properties of the sheaths.

This letter reports the design, construction, and experimental validation of a novel hand-held robot for in-office laser surgery of the vocal folds. In-office endoscopic laser surgery is an emerging trend in Laryngology: It promises to deliver the same patient outcomes of traditional surgical treatment (i.e., in the operating room), at a fraction of the cost. Unfortunately, office procedures can be challenging to perform; the optical fibers used for laser delivery can only emit light forward in a line-of-sight fashion, which severely limits anatomical access. The robot we present in this letter aims to overcome these challenges. The end effector of the robot is a steerable laser fiber, created through the combination of a thin optical fiber (0.225 mm) with a tendon-actuated Nickel-Titanium notched sheath that provides bending. This device can be seamlessly used with most commercially available endoscopes, as it is sufficiently small (1.1 mm) to pass through a working channel. To control the fiber, we propose a compact actuation unit that can be mounted on top of the endoscope handle, so that, during a procedure, the operating physician can operate both the endoscope and the steerable fiber with a single hand. We report simulation and phantom experiments demonstrating that the proposed device substantially enhances surgical access compared to current clinical fibers.

For reentry or near space communication, owing to the influence of the time-varying plasma sheath channel environment, the received IQ baseband signals are severely rotated on the constellation. Researches have shown that the frequency of electron density varies from 20kHz to 100 kHz which is on the same order as the symbol rate of most TT\&C communication systems and a mass of bandwidth will be consumed to track the time-varying channel with traditional estimation. In this paper, motivated by principal curve analysis, we propose a deep learning (DL) algorithm which called symmetric manifold network (SMN) to extract the curves on the constellation and classify the signals based on the curves. The key advantage is that SMN can achieve joint optimization of demodulation and channel estimation. From our simulation results, the new algorithm significantly reduces the symbol error rate (SER) compared to existing algorithms and enables accurate estimation of fading with extremely high bandwith utilization rate.