A team from Johns Hopkins University successfully used a robot to perform a complex abdominal surgery — this time, without guidance from humans.
The STAR, short for Smart Tissue Autonomous Robot, operated on the soft tissue of pigs to reconnect two ends of an intestine, which is said to be one of the most intricate and delicate tasks in abdominal surgery.
"The STAR performed the procedure in four animals and it produced significantly better results than humans performing the same procedure,"
said senior author Axel Krieger, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at Johns Hopkins' Whiting School of Engineering.