Robot surgeon performs surgery without a doctor for the first time

SRT-H robot surgeon, which is controlled by artificial intelligence, performed a full-fledged surgery without a doctor for the first time. Scientists from Johns Hopkins, Stanford and Columbia universities worked on this project.

It removed gall bladders in eight pig corpses with 100% accuracy. The robot also independently recognized anatomical structures, applied clips and made incisions.

Previously, robot surgeons performed narrow tasks, but now everything has changed. SRT-H for the first time independently performed a full stage of cholecystectomy, which is one of the most common operations in the world. The system combines learning based on imitation and a two-level AI architecture: the brain plans actions, and the controller embodies them in movements. The robot completed all 17 steps without errors, including switching instruments and self-correcting.

The machine learned from 16,000 examples of operations that were collected from demonstrations of gallbladder removal in pigs. It studied the processes through cameras located on the wrists and an endoscope. As the results showed, the robot works slower than a surgeon, but its movements are more precise, less jerky and shorter in trajectory.

Recall that China held the first football tournament with the participation of robot players.

To be continued…