Magnetic Tiny Robots: The Future of Medicine?

Many recent studies show the potential of magnetic medical robots in various medical applications, like reaching blood vessels within the brain in the form of catheters and micro- or nanorobots.

Steered by magnetic navigation systems, magnetic medical robots have the unique ability to access target tissue with great precision – and minimally invasive – opening many opportunities for diagnostic and therapeutic uses.

Dreyfus et al. have designed a highly dexterous helical magnetically steered continuum robot capable of navigation from the aortic arch to the millimetre-sized arteries in the head in vivo. As for Liu et al., his team has developed magnetic soft micro-fiberbots capable of controlled navigation through vasculature and shape reconfigurability to perform embolization of blood vessels in vivo. Li et al. developed an algorithm to predict the optimal patient position concerning gravity for efficient endovascular navigation of microrobots into the liver via hepatic arteries. Indeed, their algorithm can determine how to harness gravitational forces to control the microrobots’ navigation better. And finally,  Wang et al. developed a technique relying on laser speckle contrast imaging to track magnetic nanoparticles in blood vessels in both stagnant and flowing conditions in real-time ex vivo and in vivo without the need for chemical contrast agents.