Magnetic trap-based steering method for small-scale robots: Feasibility study

Abstract

This paper proposes a novel method for steering a medical small-scale robot (SSR) based on a trapping magnetic field gradient (TMG). The proposed method steers a SSR in a desired direction by keeping and moving a SSR position via a TMG point changing. To create a TMG, a field-free point (FFP) is employed, and moreover a redefined FFP generation method is suggested to design a desired shape of a magnetic field map in a unidirectional mobile-type magnetic system with four electromagnetic coils. Herein, magnetic characteristics of a TMG were analyzed on a Multiphysics simulation and compared with previous methods for steering a SSR to confirm a TMG performance. Furthermore, the proposed method was implemented to validate a SSR steering ability in tubular environments. Consequently, the proposed method was verified by demonstrating a SSR targeting performance to a specific vascular branch via in-vitro experiments.