Abstract
Cerebral aneurysms are potentially life threatening and nowadays treated by a catheter-guided coiling or by a neurosurgical clipping intervention. Here, we propose a helically shaped magnetic micro-robot, which can be steered by magnetic fields in an untethered manner and could be applied for a novel coiling procedure. This is shown by navigating the micro-robot through an additively manufactured phantom of a human cerebral aneurysm. The magnetic fields are applied with a magnetic particle imaging (MPI) scanner, which allows for the navigation and tomographic visualization by the same machine. With MPI the actuation process can be visualized with a localization accuracy of 0.68 mm and an angiogram can be acquired both without any radiation exposure. First in-vitro phantom experiments are presented, showing an idea of a robot conducted treatment of cerebral aneurysms.
Highlights
Cerebral aneurysms are potentially life threatening and nowadays treated by a catheter-guided coiling or by a neurosurgical clipping intervention
The advantage of combining Magnetic actuation (MA) with magnetic particle imaging (MPI) is that the magnetic fields generated by an MPI scanner allow MA as well, no imaging modality has to be integrated into an actuation setup or vice versa, despite that MPI is capable of tomographic real-time imaging without the need of ionizing radiation and nephrotoxic contrast a gents[17]
For steering the micro-robot into the aneurysm, the intended pathway was discretized into four path segments and the corresponding magnetic fields were programmed and applied with a preclinical MPI scanner
Summary
Cerebral aneurysms are potentially life threatening and nowadays treated by a catheter-guided coiling or by a neurosurgical clipping intervention. We propose a helically shaped magnetic micro-robot, which can be steered by magnetic fields in an untethered manner and could be applied for a novel coiling procedure. This is shown by navigating the micro-robot through an additively manufactured phantom of a human cerebral aneurysm. The magnetic fields are applied with a magnetic particle imaging (MPI) scanner, which allows for the navigation and tomographic visualization by the same machine. MPI is a medical imaging technique, which has been intensively developed within the last fifteen years and is nowadays at the stage of preclinical investigations It utilizes the nonlinear magnetization behavior of superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) and visualizes their concentration distribution[14]. Major parts of the vascular system can be reached minimal invasively including a wide range of therapeutic options, e.g. balloon dilatation and stent implantation, thrombectomy of occluded vessels and embolization/coiling of aneurysms
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