Crawling on the Heart: A Mobile Robotic Device for Minimally Invasive Cardiac Interventions

This paper describes the development and preliminary testing of a robotic device to facilitate minimally invasive beating-heart intrapericardial interventions. We propose the concept of a subxiphoid-inserted mobile robot (HeartLander) with the ability to adhere to the epicardium, navigate to any location, and administer therapy under physician control. As compared to current laparoscopic cardiac surgical techniques, this approach obviates cardiac stabilization and eliminates access limitations. Additionally, it does not require lung deflation and differential lung ventilation, and thus could open the way to outpatient cardiac therapies. The current HeartLander prototype uses suction to maintain prehension of the epicardium and wire actuation to perform locomotion. A fiber optic videoscope displays visual feedback to the physician, who controls the device through a joystick interface. A working channel provides access for the insertion of various therapeutic tools. This prototype has demonstrated successful prehension and walking during open-chest beating-heart porcine trials.