Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna

3 ARTICLES PUBLISHED IN JoVE

Bioengineering

Design and Fabrication of an Elastomeric Unit for Soft Modular Robots in Minimally Invasive Surgery

Iris De Falco¹, Giada Gerboni¹, Matteo Cianchetti¹, Arianna Menciassi¹

¹The BioRobotics Institute, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna

This paper describes the design and fabrication of a soft unit for surgical manipulators. The base module includes three flexible fluidic actuators to achieve omnidirectional bending and elongation, and a granular jamming-based mechanism to enable stiffness control. A complete mechanical characterization is also reported.

Medicine

Ultrasound-based Pulse Wave Velocity Evaluation in Mice

Nicole Di Lascio^1,2, Claudia Kusmic², Francesco Stea^2,3, Francesco Faita²

¹Institute of Life Science, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, ²Institute of Clinical Physiology, National Research Council, ³Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Pisa

Arterial stiffness represents a key factor in cardiovascular disease and pulse wave velocity (PWV) can be considered as a surrogate index for arterial stiffness. This protocol describes an image processing algorithm for calculating PWV in mice based on ultrasound image processing that is applicable at different arterial sites.

Neuroscience

Assessing Pupil-linked Changes in Locus Coeruleus-mediated Arousal Elicited by Trigeminal Stimulation

Maria Paola Tramonti Fantozzi^*1, Tommaso Banfi^*2,3, Vincenzo De Cicco^*1, Massimo Barresi⁴, Enrico Cataldo⁵, Davide De Cicco¹, Luca Bruschini⁶, Paola d'Ascanio¹, Gastone Ciuti^2,3, Ugo Faraguna^1,7, Diego Manzoni¹

¹Department of Translational Research and of New Surgical and Medical Technologies, University of Pisa, ²The BioRobotics Institute, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, ³Department of Excellence in Robotics & AI, Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, ⁴Institut des Maladie Neurodegeneratives, University of Bordeaux, ⁵Department of Physics, University of Pisa, ⁶Department of Surgical, Medical, Molecular Pathology and Critical Care Medicine, University of Pisa, ⁷Department of Developmental Neuroscience, IRCCS Foundation Stella Maris

To verify whether trigeminal effects on cognitive performance involve locus coeruleus activity, two protocols are presented that aim to evaluate possible correlations between the performance and task-related pupil size changes induced by chewing. These protocols may be applied to conditions in which locus coeruleus contribution is suspected.