Diamagnetically stabilized levitation control of an intraluminal magnetic capsule

Controlled navigation promotes full utilization of capsule endoscopy for reliable real-time diagnosis in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, but intermittent natural peristalsis can disturb the navigational control, destabilize the capsule and take it out of levitation. The focus of the present work was to develop an economical and effective real-time magnetic capsule-guiding system that can operate in the presence of naturally existing peristalsis while retaining navigational control. A real-size magnetic navigation system that can handle peristaltic forces of up to 1.5 N was designed utilizing the computer-aided design (CAD) system Maxwell 3D (Ansoft, Pittsburg, PA) and was verified using a small-size physical experimental setup. The proposed system contains a pair of 50 cm diameter, 10 000-turn copper electromagnets with a 10 cm x 10 cm ferrous core driven by currents of up to 300 A and can successfully maintain position control over the levitating capsule during peristalsis. The addition of bismuth diamagnetic casing for stabilizing the levitating capsule was also studied. A modeled magnetic field around the diamagnetically cased permanent magnet was shown to be redistributed aligning its interaction with the external electromagnets, thus stabilizing the levitating capsule. In summary, a custom-designed diamagnetically facilitated capsule navigation system can successfully steer an intraluminal magnet-carrying capsule.