Surgical Robotics

Surgical robotics studies robotic tools and systems that support clinicians, from teleoperated procedures to autonomous assistance. Approaches combine mechanisms such as continuum robots and steerable catheters with remote-center-of-motion control, haptics, and perception methods for tracking instruments and reconstructing anatomy. Learning methods include imitation learning, reinforcement learning, vision-language-action models, and world models, evaluated in simulation and on platforms such as the dVRK, with video benchmarks including JIGSAWS and EndoVis. A central challenge is translating results from simulation, phantoms, and animal studies into reliable clinical systems that generalize across anatomy and equipment while enforcing safety and keeping clinicians involved.