The procedure Kim chose for the robot to master was cholecystectomy, a surgical gallbladder removal routinely performed in US hospitals (roughly 700,000 times a year). The objective is to remove the tubes connecting the gallbladder to other organs without causing the internal fluids to flow out. Kim's team broke this procedure down into 17 steps, sourced lots of porcine gallbladder and liver samples from pig cadavers to experiment on, and had a trained research assistant operate a DaVinci robot, performing the procedure over and over again to build the training data set for the robot.
Because UPEs are related to oxidative metabolism, the most immediately relevant applications might include the detection of budding brain tumors, excitotoxic lesions, mild traumatic injuries, and neurotoxic insults.
With over two decades of experience, Roberto Ballestero Diego highlights the shift in urology from open surgery to essential advancements like robotic-assisted surgery for various procedures.