Root Canal Preparation Robot Based on Guiding Strategy for Safe Remote Therapy: System Design and Feasibility Study (2023)

Dental diseases are related to the physical and mental health of patients. However, the spread of bacteria and pathogens in treatment is easy to cause cross-infection between professionals and patients. We propose a promising approach to overcome this problem using robot-assisted teletherapy. The designed root canal preparation robot (RCPR) system includes an image navigation module, a leader-follower control module, and a force feedback interactive module. A leader-follower consistent motion mapping model considering oral confined space is proposed to ensure intuitive operation. One of our contributions is employing the snow ablation optimizer-long short-term memory neural network to approximate the dynamics of the UR robot, predict tracking errors in the task space when external perturbations are present, and precorrect commands from the outer loop, minimizing the tracking error caused by the inability to change the inner loop control. Another contribution is that a mode-switching-based virtual and actual force feedback model is proposed, the virtual force is derived from the improved Lennard-Jones potential field, which can guide the operator to locate the affected tooth in the oral space. Finally, the consistency, tracking error and intraoperative force feedback experiment under human-robot interaction are carried out. The results validate the feasibility of the RCPR. Based on the guiding strategy, RCPR can provide efficient and safe root canal therapy.