Consumi, Vanni;
(2025)
A Soft Robotics Approach For Colonoscopy.
Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).
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Abstract
Current standard approaches for cancer screening and intervention in the lower gastrointestinal tract involve the use of a semi-flexible colonoscope that is manually manipulated by the clinician through the intestine of the patient, making the examination invasive and typically requiring sedation to ease patient discomfort. Moreover, highly trained personnel are essential for successful colonoscopies due to the intestine’s complexity and challenging accessibility. This thesis focuses on designing and creating a novel tethered robotic capsule for colonoscopy, aimed at enabling minimally invasive intervention for intestinal diseases. The innovative design of the system incorporates soft tracks for locomotion and inflatable toroidal chambers to adapt the diameter of the robot to the local lumen of the gastrointestinal tract. This enhances the full-body locomotion of the system, allowing the clinician to control the contact pressure of the tracks with the outer wall of the intestine, thereby to achieve a static friction coupling that maximises the propulsion of the device and minimises patient discomfort. The radial expansion of the inflatable chambers enables the robot to stabilise itself within the lumen and distend local folds of the intestine, improving screening quality and treatment efficacy for gastrointestinal disorders. The pre-clinical assessment of the locomotion and the adaptability performance of the system, integrated with front-facing camera and surgical tool, demonstrates the capability of the soft robot to move inside intricate passages, capture internal images, and adjust its geometry to various geometries of the human large intestine to enhance traction force. This research promises to advance robotic solutions for safe and effective intraluminal intervention, offering a platform to facilitate medical practice and enhance patient care outcomes.
| Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Qualification: | Ph.D |
| Title: | A Soft Robotics Approach For Colonoscopy |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © The Author 2025. Original content in this thesis is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/). Any third-party copyright material present remains the property of its respective owner(s) and is licensed under its existing terms. Access may initially be restricted at the author’s request. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science > Dept of Med Phys and Biomedical Eng |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10208751 |
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