Evaluation of stiffness calculation for organ palpation device with electro-hydraulic transmission system based remote actuator

The purpose of this research is to realize the novel palpation method called 'organ palpation'. In conventional palpation method, the doctor knows the hardness of organ by his force sense. However, the organ palpation can get the quantitative hardness value by pushing the organ directly. In order to measure the hardness of organ directly, a remote actuator and an endoscope are utilized. In this paper, Electro-hydraulic transmission system (EHTS) based remote actuator is utilized for organ palpation. EHTS is one of the actuating systems using the fluid energy and mechanical energy. This actuator can transmit the position and force remotely without transmission loss. In order to confirm the efficacy of organ palpation device, the experiment assuming organ palpation is done. Through the experimental results, the environment stiffness calculation performance of EHTS based remote actuator is confirmed. In addition, the performance of EHTS based remote actuator is compared with 'flexible actuator'.