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Intelligent Scalpels Through Touch Technology
DullTrev writes: "The BBC News site is running a story about touch technology. Basically, haptics is the science of incorporating a sense of touch into technology. Scientists at the University of Tokyo have developed a sensor which can feel. So you could have a surgeon operating with a scalpel incorporating this technology, the scalpel could push back against the surgeon when he tries to slice and dice an artery. I'm sure there could be loads of applications for this technology - most uselessly the test these scientists have been doing - stopping cutting a hardboiled egg when you get to the yolk..."
..that surgeons make enough mistakes that something like this is perceived as necessary.
Because, simply, it would mean a surgeon wouldn't have to travel the world to operate on different people. He/She could work on someone in Paris, and then a few hours later do another operation on someone in Sydney, and then another on someone in Los Angles. Qualified surgeons are a rare bunch and the more people who have access to their skills the better..
Also, sometimes surgeons can't be there. How about operating in a war zone. Or on an astronaut in space..
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most uselessly the test these scientists have been doing
Useless tests?
This is an experimental new tool. The scientists are predicting it can be used to detect (say) the membrane surrounding blood vessels, yet these tests are useless?
It would be both foolish and ignorant to test out an EXPERIMENTAL tool that actually MOVES in a surgical life/death environment. What then could be used to test out its detection of slight changes in membrane? Hello? The layer surrounding the yolk would be similiar to the same one you would see in a vessel...
Difference? If the tool screws up with the egg, then you can have scrambled eggs... the result in a person isnt even half as good.
The surgeon is being trained to keep cutting until the knife warns him that the tissue he's about to cut is important.
So if the knife DOESN'T warn him - even for a couple miliseconds, he cuts right through arteries or nerves.
The potential for trouble is enormous.
And unlike VR built from MRI imaging, there's no indication that a failure is in progress until the damage is done.
I sure hope the authors of any software involved, and the designers of any hardware, are VERY good at building a VERY robust product.
I remember a certain radiation therapy machine, which operated in two modes - one with an attenuation shield, one without it. If you typed too fast on the touch-panel control, it would go through the whole cycle normally, but with the shield OUT rather than IN. Killed several patients before they figured out what was happening.
I hear they had done a marvelous faiure analysis on the hardware. But they had assumed the software would be perfect.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Something I have been wondering for a while...
how would they go about doing this? They would have to use some kind of telecommunications equipment so transmission of data/pictures/etc could be available to the doctor in REAL TIME.
AFAIK, any kind of connection between countries will not be instant nor semi-instant. Can you imagine the problems associated with lag or a "disconnection" while in the midst of dangerous surgery?
It is a very interesting concept, but one that should not even be explored until we have the capabilities to give realtime data transmission and to guarentee that random/arbitrary disconnects just dont occur. Doesnt matter how bad your local doctor is if the perfect "virtual" doctor might just disappear on you as he is cutting into a heart...
Obviously you've never considered Australia (or any other sparsely populated area)
Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
Meaning everyone will have two little needles in a box on their desktop, which they can use to feel the texture of a website? My guess is that successfully bringing haptics to the desktop and making them part of everyday usage will not happen "soon", but will take a great deal more development until the same quality of tactile feedback can be translated to, say, a VR glove, and linked to visuals. Even then, in its initial stages, I see few applications beyond some games and pr0n.
Ceci n'est pas une sig
It is a very interesting concept, but one that should not even be explored until we have the capabilities to give realtime data transmission and to guarentee that random/arbitrary disconnects just dont occur.
We basicly do, Iternet2. there are FAR less users than on the regular internet, everyone has a minimum of 150K/s? (can't remember) and i seriously doubt anyone would get random disconections.
Only dead fish swim with the stream...