NASA Performs Zero-G Robot Surgery for Mars, Iraq

An anonymous reader writes "With rapid-response surgery needed in Iraq and super-long-distance medicine a far-off necessity for a manned trip to Mars, NASA recently sent eight astronauts, roboticists and surgeons on its 'Vomit Comet,' pitting real doctors against new robotic ones. As if the prospect of a portable robo-OR deploying to Iraq by 2009 weren't enticing enough, one of the surgeons on board promised this in his flight blog: 'So far, surgery by hand is still the most efficient way to get the job done in a mobile, extreme environment. But robots are advancing rapidly... The solution that roboticists are working on now is to CAT scan a patient's entire body and beam the results back to Earth. Then a surgeon could program an operation and beam it back to upload into a robo-surgeon, which could carry out procedures like a player piano.'"

Comments

Mars and Iraq

[merikari]

This is wildly off topic... wait no it isn't. Iraq and Mars in the title are just too excrucuiating for most people who want the a manned Mars mission to happen. Enough already. With the price of Iraq you USians would already be in Mars. For example, with Mars Direct, with the initial price tag of $55 million, you could have set up several missions already (even if the estimate would be doubled or tripled) for the price tag of the Iraq Invasion.

Sadly, I believe that you have a president who really couldn't care less. I don't care what he says in public about going back to the Moon. He probably speaks with his god and god has agreed with him that Earth is the center of the universe