Vanderbilt Engineers Open Up Their Medical Capsule Robot Technology

Researchers at the Vanderbilt University have pioneered the development of capsule robots which aim to make internal surgeries easier and safer, about two years ago the research scientists from the School of Engineering were given a $1 million grant by the National Science Foundation for this purpose. They have done substantial work and would now like to see this technology be developed even further, which is why they have made their medical capsule robot technology open source.

The robot capsules are small enough that they can easily be swallowed by the patient, and the team behind it have also put together a hardware and software development kit to make sure that this technology is put to use.

They’ve made the hardware and software development kit available online freely so that other researchers who are interested in developing their own medical capsule robots have a base to start off from.

Pietro Valdastri, who is the director of Vanderbilt’s Science and Technology of Robotics in Medicine Lab said that they have already completed the custom capsule design, one for the stomach, one for the colon and another with a surgical clip to stop bleeding. The team wanted to give people working in the same field a nudge in the right direction hence the decision to make this open source.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Medical, Robots