HCC Seminar Series: Surgical Robotics and Human-Computer Interaction at the Limits of Human Dexterity

Abstract

Surgical robots enjoy widespread use. This catalyzes the growing field of computational surgery where “it’s no longer blood and guts, it’s bits and bytes.” Unfortunately, surgical errors remain uncomfortably common.  What if surgeons are simply at the boundary of what human dexterity can physically accomplish?  What if surgical robots–with the appropriate interface–could help amplify human dexterity to avoid some of these errors? … or even enable new treatments currently thought to be impossible?

This talk will focus on two research topics.  First, how do we quantify the technical skill of a surgeon across and beyond the existing range of expertise? Second, what methods can enable seamless collaboration between surgeon and robot to amplify skills–possibly beyond existing human capabilities?  Topics will cover the notion of biological motion processing to infer human skill from visible motion; how humans perceive superhuman dexterity or speed; and propose handheld robotics as a means to merge human and robot capabilities seamlessly in this space. This can leverage bidirectional human-robot interaction through both mechanical channels (via low-latency, low-bandwidth motion, forces, and impedances in the human arm, hand, and fingers) and visual channels (with high latency and high bandwidth).

Biography

Dr. Kowalewski completed his PhD in electrical engineering in quantitative surgical skill evaluation at the University of Washington Biorobotics lab and served as a research scientist at DARPA’s “Traumapod: Operating room of the future” project.   This work was recognized with  a best doctoral candidate award at the American College of Surgeons AEI Consortium on SurgicalRobotics and Simulation. He commercialized his PhD work for quantitative skill evaluation (Simulab Corp., Seattle, WA) and also co-pioneered the use of crowdsourcing for high-volume assessment of surgical skills.  Based on his research, he co-founded CSATS Inc. which has impacted surgical practice throughout the United States (acquired by Johnson & Johnson in April 2018).  He is a recipient of an NSF CAREER award and a McKnight Presidential Fellow and is funded by the NSF, NIH, DoD Army Futures Command, and industry.  He is currently an associate professor in mechanical engineering with adjunct appointments in biomedical engineering and electrical and computer engineering at the University of Minnesota and an affiliate associate professor in surgical simulation science at the University of Washington, Seattle.