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Robotic Surgery On a Beating Heart
An anonymous reader writes "Serious heart surgery usually involves stopping the organ and keeping the patient alive with a cardiopulmonary bypass machine. But this risks brain damage and requires a long recuperation. Scientists at Harvard University and Children's Hospital Boston have now developed a device that lets surgeons operate on a beating heart with a steady hand. The 'robotic' device uses 3-D ultrasound images to predict and compensate for the motion of the heart so that the surgeon can work on a faulty valve as it moves. The approach should improve recovery times and give a surgeon instant feedback on the success of the procedure, the researchers say. Here's a (slightly gory) video of the device in action."
NOW THEY'RE DISSECTING US!
Your question contains the answer. What would happen is a blue screen of, you know, death.
Seriously though, even if the software were written to be somehow provably correct, hardware can always fail. So can the surgeon.
...the repercussions are a more literal translation of BSOD then we generally want..
So basically, -1 troll/offtopic is really slashdots way of saying "I hate that you thought of something before me."
I'd gladly be touched by a robot as long as it left less of a mess on the way out.
Pervert.
Otherwise I would have had NO idea what this thing does!! Am I the only one that got 2 seconds of what looks like a hypodermic and a back massager?
Only if you could combine the machine and the heart with one of these
As opposed to a Mac, where the device draws a cute little Hello Kitty on your chest with stitches?
You know, now that I think about it, that would be pretty kick-ass.