Dual mode ultrasonics

Overview

This project develops a new approach to ultrasonic sensing, sending and receiving high frequency acoustic pulses from a low frequency platform to modulate spectral content and microscale spatial offsets. In doing so, it will give surgical robotics platforms access to the rich array of physical information in acoustic pulses, which can be used to characterise tissues encountered during surgery and guide the robot in the intervention itself.

Research activities

• Conduct a comprehensive review of existing ultrasonic sensing technologies and their applications in surgical robotics.
• Develop algorithms and components to enable ultrasound-based sensing in a robotics context.
• Investigate and implement advanced signal processing techniques.
• Build protype systems that integrate with state-of-the-art surgical robotics systems.
• Conduct experiments to validate the performance of the ultrasonic sensing system, focusing on its ability to characterize tissues and guide surgical interventions.

Outcomes

• Candidate designs and techniques using ultrasound for in-body sensing.
• Experimental demonstration of the effectiveness of the proposed approach in comparison to existing techniques.

Skills and experience

• The applicant is expected to have a background in either engineering (mechanical, electrical, medical, mechatronics), robotics, physics, biomedical or a related field.
• A master degree or a bachelor degree with excellent academic record is desirable.
• Students who enjoy learning new techniques and working with robots will find this project attractive.
• The ability to communicate with people of diverse backgrounds is desirable.
• Excellent oral and written communication skills in English are expected.
• Proficiency in a programming language is a bonus.

Scholarships

You may be eligible to apply for a research scholarship.

Explore our research scholarships

Keywords

• surgery
• robot
• ultrasound
• sensing

Contact

Contact the supervisor for more information.