3D Steerable Biopsy Needle with a Motorized Manipulation System and Ultrasound Tracking to Navigate inside Tissue

Needle insertion techniques have been used in several minimally invasive procedures for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. For example, in tissue biopsy, a small sample of suspicious tissue is extracted using percutaneous needles for further analysis. A clinically significant biopsy sample is a definitive factor in cancer diagnosis; therefore, precise placement of the needle tip at target location is necessary. However, it is often challenging to guide and track the needle in a desired path to reach the target precisely, while avoiding sensitive organs or large arteries. Needle steering has been an active field of research in the past decade. Researchers have introduced passive and active needles to improve navigation and targeting inside the tissue. This work introduces a novel active steerable biopsy needle capable of bending inside the tissue in multiple directions. The needle is equipped with a biopsy mechanism to extract suspicious tissue. A motorized manipulation system is developed and programmed to pull the cable tendons and control the needle deflection inside tissue. To show the feasibility of the design concept, the active needle manipulation in air and in a tissue-mimicking phantom is evaluated. An average angular deflection of about 12.40 ∘ and 11.34 ∘ in three principal directions is realized in air and phantom tissue, respectively, which is expected to assist in breast cancer biopsy. A robot-assisted ultrasound tracking method is also proposed to track the active needle tip inside the phantom tissue in real time. It is shown that using this method, the needle tip can be tracked in real time with an average and maximum tracking error of [Formula: see text][Formula: see text]mm and [Formula: see text][Formula: see text]mm, respectively.