Micro-/Nanorobotics for Clinical Applications

Hong Kong SAR, Hong Kong

Through InnoHK funding support of the HKSAR Government, the Multi-Scale Medical Robotics Center (MRC) was established in April 2020 by the Faculty of Medicine and the Faculty of Engineering of the Chinese University of Hong Kong in collaboration with ETH Zürich, Imperial College London, Johns Hopkins University, and Technical University of Munich. With the advancement of AI, imaging and robotic technologies, novel robotic-assisted surgical procedures and therapeutic methods are transforming medical diagnosis and treatment solutions. Such technologies enhance the visualization, accessibility, and accuracy for the surgeons to carry out minimally invasive surgeries that are more accessible to patients worldwide. The Multi-Scale Medical Robotics Center brings the worlds of medicine and robotics together, focusing on technological innovation with a strong emphasis on clinical translation and direct patient benefits. The Center serves as a synergistic platform for clinicians, engineers and researchers from local and overseas universities to work together and forge new ways to translate biomedical engineering research innovations into medical practices. The Multi-Scale Medical Robotics Center will support three research programmes: • Endoluminal multi-scale robotic platforms for diagnostics and therapeutics • Magnetic-guided endoluminal robotic platform • Image-guided robotic interventions Together as a medtech translation ecosystem, the Multi-Scale Medical Robotics Center is within 15 minutes' drive from Prince of Wales Hospital and CUHK Medical Centre, the two teaching hospitals of CUHK where clinical trials will be conducted. In the long run, the Center will serve as a medical robotics incubation hub to foster medical technology start-ups, to provide training in surgical robotic technologies, to offer pre-clinical evaluation support services and to promote the commercialization of novel medical robotics technologies.