The development of Smart Cyber Operating Theater (SCOT), an innovative medical robot architecture that can allow surgeons to freely select and connect master and slave telesurgical robots

Master-slave robotic technology demonstrates a distinct model of communication that allows one device or user to have unidirectional control over one or more devices. The master refers to the user or device that initiates and controls the transmission, while the slave is the unit that receives these commands and acts accordingly. The direction of control always flows from the master to the slave. This technology has found a plethora of applications in a variety of fields such as engineering, information technology as well as hydraulic and pneumatic systems. Robotic technology has become an integral part of medical applications involving telesurgery (remote surgery) owing to the profound advantages it can offer to both surgeons and patience. Not only is surgery in previously-inoperable conditions now possible through this technology, but robotics also offer additional advantages in the training of medical professionals.

In laparoscopic surgery, a high level of accuracy and control are required due to the complex nature and small scale of the area involved. Here, robotically-assisted surgery is performed by the surgeon using master-slave remotely-controlled manipulators or integrating locally-operated small surgical robots in a sterilised area. However, the fundamental problem associated with this master-slave system is that the master and the slave cannot be separated and exchanged with a master or a slave of another system. Performance of the robotic systems during these operations often come across limitations due to the inability of a slave robot to match the pace and performance of the master or the need for different tools during surgery, forcing a requirement for separate master-slave pairs.

This creates an inefficiency in the system that Professor Ken Masamune from the Institute of Advance Biomedical Engineering and Science at the Tokyo Women’s Medical University seeks to address. By introducing a middleware that will connect these various masters and slaves, Masamune and his team seek to allow optimal communication and evaluation between robotic units. By separating the master from the slave and using middleware to allow communication between modules, the architecture being developed by Masamune, together with a group of collaborators, provides a quick evaluation of the master-slave combination and enables a far more efficient development and use of telesurgical robots.