4.1. Experimental Setup
Figure 6 gives the experimental setup. All experiments are performed with the proposed ophthalmic surgical robot (
Section 2). A force sensor (LSB200-20g, Futek, USA, precision: 0.2 mN) and a surgical cannulation needle (41G, Incyto, South Korea, diameter: 90μm) are attached to the end of the proposed robot.
Experiments using the chicken chorioallantoic membrane of 13 days fertilized chicken embryos (
Figure 7) are performed to estimate the proposed force controller. All experiments are supervised by an expert surgeon with more than 20 years clinical experience. The surgeon make sure that the cannulation needle contact the vessel precisely.
The cannulation needle is driven by the piezoelectric linear stage of the proposed robot. Data is collected using an industrial computer (ARK3523, Advantech, China), which also calculates velocity command based on ADRC and sends it to the controller of piezoelectric linear stage via USB communication. The needle's moving accuracy is approximately 25 nm. Sampling and control frequency are 200 Hz.
In this article, we perform three groups of experiments to estimate the force controller. The detail setup of each group is given as below:
I. Parameter identification. This group aims to identify the vein’s mechanical parameter (Eave and τave) from step response data. In this group, the pose of robot is chosen randomly. Five embryos are used in this group. For each embryo, we adjust the robot to contact the vein, move 0.5mm along axis z, keep steady and record the contact force.
For each embryo, we choose 1 contact point with 10 replicates each point. The contact point is carefully selected by an ophthalmic doctor. Then, the model parameters (Ei,ave, τi,ave, i=1,2) in viscoelastic contact model can be obtained by fitting the collected force data to Eq.3.
II. Step test. This group uses another five embryos in group I. For each embryo, we adjust the robot to contact the vein, move the needle along axis z to reach the desired force. The desired force is set as 5mN. For each embryo, the pose of robot is set as 3 conditions: θ1=45°; θ1=30°; θ1=0°. For each pose, we choose 3 contact points with 5 replicates each point.
III. Precise adjustment. Another five embryos are used in this group. In this group, the pose of robot is same with group II.
For each pose, we choose 2 contact points with 5 replicates each point. In each test, we first set the desired force between 1mN and 5mN. Then, we increases / decreases the desired force by 1mN or 1.5 mN every 5 seconds. In Group II and Group III, after tunning, b0, ωc and ω0 are set as 20, 16 and 60, respectively.
4.2. Results and Discussion
This part gives the experimental results.
Figure 8 and
Table 1 show the results of Group I and Group II.
Figure 8(a)-(e) are the step response curve of every embryo. The fitted parameters (
Ei,ave,
τi,ave,
i=1,2) are given in
Table 1.
Figure 8(f)-(j) are the results of Group II.
The steady state error (SSE) and response time are also given in
Table 1. As shown in
Figure 8 and
Table 1, for all tested embryos, the coefficient of determination
R2 is over 0.97. That means all the fitted parameters are reliable. But the value of
E1,ave,
τ1,ave,
E2,ave,
τ2,ave reach variation of over 81.2%, 73.4%, 403.8%, 172.3%, respectively. The model parameters do show large interindividual differences. With the proposed controller, the SSE is [0.24, 0.35] mN. The response time ranges from 1.41s to 2.23s. No obvious overshot occurs. The proposed controller is capable of rejecting the disturbance caused by the uncertainty of contact model.
As shown in
Figure 9(a)-(e), the proposed controller can adjust the contact force at 1-mN interval. No obvious overshot occurs in Group III. The root mean square (RMS) value of SSE of Group II and Group III are 0.25mN, and 0.41mN, respectively. The response time ranges from 1.04s to 2.51s, the RMS and maximum SSE are 0.32 mN and 0.47 mN, respectively.
Experimental results indicate the proposed ADRC controller is capable of rejecting the disturbance and controlling the contact force precisely. The RMS value of SSE is lower than the acceptable overshot in previous works (0.9 mN) [
15,
17], close to the force sensing accuracy in previous work (about 0.3 mN) [
7,
14,
18]. In Group III, the larger error associated with “decreasing the desired force” might be attributed to the hysteresis influence of vein.
About 80% of the vein puncture force is less than 5mN[
5]. Hence, the same value is adopted as the desired force in Group II. The standard deviation of vein puncture force is 1mN[
5]. Therefore, the same value is set as the force intervals.
In this article, the contact force is measured by a commercial force sensor, which is too large to enter the scleral port. This issue could be relieved by replacing the force sensor with customized micro-force sensor developed by FBG, which is a part of our ongoing study. The force sensor’s precision (0.2 mN) is higher than FBG force sensors (2 mN[27]). As a result, we believe the measured force data is reliable, and the proposed controller is suitable for retina vein cannulation.
It is possible to reduce the response time by increasing ωc,but this can result in severe overshot, which increase surgical risk. Therefore, we choose to prioritize reducing the overshot, even if it means sacrificing response time.
We did not perform dynamic tracking experiments for the following reason. The proposed controller aims to reject disturbance and control the force during the contact process shown in
Figure 1. The expected force should precisely puncture the vein without damaging retina. In this context, the expected force is more likely to be static and specific, rather than dynamic. Therefore, we choose to perform step response experiment and precise adjustment experiment to evaluate the disturbance rejection ability of the ADRC.
While dynamic force might have potential benefits in RVC, this paper focuses on the disturbance rejection ability of the proposed controller. The effect of dynamic force, validating this work with more samples (in-vivo/ex-vivo, pig/rabbit) belong to our ongoing study.
In our study, we use two sets of embryos, which we refer to as Group I and Group II. The reason for this is that in experimental studies, we are able to collect data and identify the viscoelastic contact model multiple times. However, in clinical settings, the parameters of each tested sample can vary significantly from the identified model, resulting in increased control error.
Our proposed method is able to accurately identify the precise value of each tested sample based on previously collected data, allowing us to control the contact force with great precision. This precise control of the contact force is the key feature of our proposed method.
The embryos in Group I are used to collect data, while the embryos in Group II are the samples tested in the clinical setting. By using the data collected from Group I, our proposed method is able to accurately control the contact force in Group II, even though the embryos in Group II are completely different from those in Group I. For this work, the ADRC is designed such that the robot can control the contact force automatically. In the future, a hybrid control method will be investigated for injecting clot-dissolving drugs, which will simultaneously limit the needle's position and contact force. This could be a potential solution to free surgeons from extremely difficult injection procedures and improve overall surgical efficiency.