title: Miniaturized force/torque sensor for in vivo measurements of tissue characteristics.
abstract: This paper presents the development of a surgical instrument to measure interaction forces/torques with organic tissue during operation. The focus is on the design progress of the sensor element, consisting of a spoke wheel deformation element with a diameter of 12 mm and eight inhomogeneous doped piezoresistive silicon strain gauges on an integrated full-bridge assembly with an edge length of 500 μm. The silicon chips are contacted to flex-circuits via flip chip and bonded on the substrate with a single component adhesive. A signal processing board with an 18 bit serial A/D converter is integrated into the sensor. The design concept of the handheld surgical sensor device consists of an instrument coupling, the six-axis sensor, a wireless communication interface and battery. The nominal force of the sensing element is 10 N and the nominal torque is 1 N-m in all spatial directions. A first characterization of the force sensor results in a maximal systematic error of 4.92 % and random error of 1.13 %.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hessinger
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Pilic
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Werthschutzky
authors.forename: P P
authors.initials: PP
authors.lastname: Pott
mesh_terms: D007431:Intraoperative Complications / Q000517:prevention & control; D012815:Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted; D012825:Silicon; D013525:Surgical Instruments; D013514:Surgical Procedures, Operative; D019415:Torque
chemical_list: D012825:Silicon