9 papers
Bayesian Continuum Robot Dynamics and State Estimation
James M. Ferguson, Tucker Hermans, Alan Kuntz
Recent factor graph approaches to continuum robot state estimation have been successful for quasi-static applications and spatiotemporal estimation using white-noise kinematic moti…
Differentiable Mesh State Estimation via Factor Graph Inference for Deformable Object Reconstruction
Lidia Al-Zogbi, Fangjie Li, Samuel Tobin +13
Estimating deformable object states remains a fundamental challenge in robotics and simulation. We propose a novel factor graph-based framework for probabilistic mesh state estimat…
Bayesian Retraction Optimization for Tissue Attachment Mapping in Surgical Dissection
Shing-Hei Ho, Bao Thach, Toan Vo +2
With growing surgeon shortages, automating surgical sub-tasks such as tissue dissection offers a promising step toward reducing workload and expanding patient access. Prior work ha…
Neural Operators for Design-Space Surrogate Modeling of Tendon-Actuated Continuum Robots
Branden Frieden, James M. Ferguson, Alan Kuntz +1
Continuum robots enable dexterous manipulation in constrained environments, but require accurate and efficient models for real-time manipulation and control. Traditional physics-ba…
PinPoint: Monocular Needle Pose Estimation for Robotic Suturing via Stein Variational Newton and Geometric Residuals
Jesse F. d'Almeida, Tanner Watts, Susheela Sharma Stern +3
Reliable estimation of surgical needle 3D position and orientation is essential for autonomous robotic suturing, yet existing methods operate almost exclusively under stereoscopic…
Continuum Robot State Estimation with Actuation Uncertainty
James M. Ferguson, Alan Kuntz, Tucker Hermans
Continuum robots are flexible, slender manipulators well suited for confined surgical environments. In these settings, unknown interaction forces and model uncertainty significantl…
ProbeMDE: Uncertainty-Guided Active Proprioception for Monocular Depth Estimation in Surgical Robotics
Britton Jordan, Jordan Thompson, Jesse F. d'Almeida +8
Monocular depth estimation (MDE) provides a useful tool for robotic perception, but its predictions are often uncertain and inaccurate in challenging environments such as surgical…
A Supervised Autonomous Resection and Retraction Framework for Transurethral Enucleation of the Prostatic Median Lobe
Mariana Smith, Tanner Watts, Susheela Sharma Stern +15
Concentric tube robots (CTRs) offer dexterous motion at millimeter scales, enabling minimally invasive procedures through natural orifices. This work presents a coordinated model-b…
DiffDef: A Diffusion Model for Generating Multimodal Goal Shapes From Demonstrations for Deformable Object Manipulation
Bao Thach, Tanner Watts, Siyeon Kim +6
Deformable object manipulation is a key capability in many robotic applications. A promising paradigm for this problem is shape servoing, which aims to control deformable objects t…