%0 Journal Article
%T Development of a continuum manipulator with variable bending length and piecewise stiffness for transoral laryngeal surgery.
%A Yang W
%A Cao Y
%A Wang S
%A Liu Z
%A Cheng H
%A Xie L
%J Int J Comput Assist Radiol Surg
%V 0
%N 0
%D 2024 May 29
%M 38809318
%F 3.421
%R 10.1007/s11548-024-03194-z
%X <B>OBJECTIVE: </B>Continuum manipulators (CMs) show great potential in transoral laryngeal surgery due to their flexibility. However, CMs for transoral surgery face several issues: large size, which reduces practicality; intersegment coupling, which causes undesired deflection; and a lack of versatility that limits their applicability across different patient groups.<BR><B>METHODS: </B>This work combines a rod-driven proximal segment and a cable-driven distal segment to achieve piecewise stiffness, alleviating the issue of intersegment coupling. A rigid constraint tube is integrated into the proximal segment to diversify its bending behavior. Preliminary experiments are conducted to validate the design concept.<BR><B>RESULTS: </B>The proposed CM has an overall diameter of only 6.5 mm. The proximal segment can achieve a 90° bending with various curvatures. At the working configuration, the coupling error between the proximal segment and the distal segment is less than 1 mm. The effectiveness of the proposed CM is successfully validated using a human model.<BR><B>CONCLUSIONS: </B>The proposed continuum manipulator possesses the desirable characteristics of small size, low coupling, and high versatility, indicating its great potentialities for the diagnosis and treatment of laryngeal lesion.