Micro-/nanorobots hold tremendous potential for minimally-invasive medicine, as they can navigate biological environments under wireless powering and control. To reach the target location in the body, one major challenge is to penetrate dense soft tissues. In this talk, I will discuss several ways for micro-/nanorobots to penetrate the biological tissue barriers. In our previous work, we have shown the first tissue-penetrating nanorobots that can magnetically propel through the vitreous of the eye and precisely target at the optic disc of the retina; and an optimized helical microrobot that is able to drill through viscoelastic tissues in the liver and the brain. I will highlight some recent developments on the localization and sensing of the microdevices, and introduce a new kind of microrobots that can collaborate and move payloads that is ten times heavier than an individual robot on the slippery luminal surface of inner organs. The microrobots will lead to many new opportunities for minimally-invasive surgical procedures.
Prof. Tian Qiu is the head of the “Smart Technology for Tumor Therapy” division at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) Site Dresden. He is also a professor at both the Faculty of Medicine and the Faculty of Electrical and Computer Engineering, TU Dresden. He received the Bachelor and Master from Tsinghua University, China; and the Ph.D. from Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland. He did his postdoctoral research at Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, and led the Cyber Valley research group at the University of Stuttgart, before joining DKFZ. His main research interest is micro/nano-robotics for minimally-invasive medicine. He has published more than 30 journal papers, including 4 Nature Group publications and 1 Science Group publication. He also holds 15 patents, and 6 of which were licensed to the industry. He received many awards, including the Best Micro-robot Design Award at the Hamlyn Symposium on Medical Robotics and the ERC Starting Grant “VIBEBOT” aiming to develop the first tissue-penetrating micro-robots.
Micro-/nanorobots hold tremendous potential for minimally-invasive medicine, as they can navigate biological environments under wireless powering and control. To reach the target location in the body, one major challenge is to penetrate dense soft tissues. In this talk, I will discuss several ways for micro-/nanorobots to penetrate the biological tissue barriers. In our previous work, we have shown the first tissue-penetrating nanorobots that can magnetically propel through the vitreous of the eye and precisely target at the optic disc of the retina; and an optimized helical microrobot that is able to drill through viscoelastic tissues in the liver and the brain. I will highlight some recent developments on the localization and sensing of the microdevices, and introduce a new kind of microrobots that can collaborate and move payloads that is ten times heavier than an individual robot on the slippery luminal surface of inner organs. The microrobots will lead to many new opportunities for minimally-invasive surgical procedures.
Prof. Tian Qiu is the head of the “Smart Technology for Tumor Therapy” division at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) Site Dresden. He is also a professor at both the Faculty of Medicine and the Faculty of Electrical and Computer Engineering, TU Dresden. He received the Bachelor and Master from Tsinghua University, China; and the Ph.D. from Swiss Federal Institute of Technology at Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland. He did his postdoctoral research at Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, and led the Cyber Valley research group at the University of Stuttgart, before joining DKFZ. His main research interest is micro/nano-robotics for minimally-invasive medicine. He has published more than 30 journal papers, including 4 Nature Group publications and 1 Science Group publication. He also holds 15 patents, and 6 of which were licensed to the industry. He received many awards, including the Best Micro-robot Design Award at the Hamlyn Symposium on Medical Robotics and the ERC Starting Grant “VIBEBOT” aiming to develop the first tissue-penetrating micro-robots.
