Deadlock-Free and Collision-Free Liver Surgical Navigation by Switching Potential-Based and Sensor-Based Functions

Abstract

In this study, we developed a deadlock-free and collision-free liver surgical navigation method by switching potential-based and sensor-based approaches. The potential-based approach selects a near-optimal route from a scalpel tip to an arbitrary neighbor position around a tumor in a 3D organ map converted from digital imaging and communications in medicine (DICOM) data captured by magnetic resonance imaging or computed tomography. However, among complex-shaped blood vessels, the approach sometimes loses the route. To overcome this drawback, we switch to the sensor-based approach. This approach always finds a route near a tumor. However, the path becomes longer. Therefore, when the potential-based approach recovers to find another path, we switch the sensor-based approach back to the potential-based approach. The usefulness of this switching method was carefully ascertained in several kinds of allocations of tumor and blood vessels.