Talk starts at 4:00pm
Reception begins at 5:00pm

Pierre E. Dupont, Ph.D.
Boston Children's Hospital, Harvard Medical School

A Menagerie of Medical Robots

Abstract:
My lab creates medical robots not only for minimally invasive surgery, but also for targeted drug delivery and for inducing tissue growth.  This talk will describe three of our technologies. The first is a type of continuum robot that is based on concentrically combining pre-curved elastic tubes. We are using this technology to create cardiac catheters with tip-mounted endoscopic imaging and exploring their application to both teleoperated and semi-autonomous beating-heart interventions. The second technology consists of tetherless robots that are powered, controlled and imaged using an MRI scanner. These devices vary from patient-mounted needle-driving robots to capsules that can move inside fluid-filled body lumens. The third technology is comprised of robotic implants that apply traction forces to induce soft tissue growth. Applications include lengthening the esophagus and bowel for the treatment of congenital defects and disease.

Biography:
Pierre E. Dupont is Chief of Pediatric Cardiac Bioengineering and holder of the Edward P. Marram Chair at Boston Children’s Hospital. He is also a Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. His research group develops robotic instrumentation and imaging technology for medical applications. He received the BS, MS and PhD degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, USA. After graduation, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA. He subsequently moved to Boston University, Boston, MA, USA where he was a Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering. He is an IEEE Fellow, a Senior Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Robotics and a member of the Advisory Board for Science Robotics.