MEMS Pearsall Distinguished Lecture: Metin Sitti (Koç University, Turkey), "Wireless Milli/Microscale Robots for Biomedical Applications"
The Thomas Lord Department of Mechanical Engineering & Materials Science hosts Dr. Metin Sitti (Koç University) to present the Pearsall Distinguished Lecture, "Wireless Milli/Microscale Robots for Biomedical Applications."
ABSTRACT: Wireless small-scale medical robots have the unique capability of navigating, operating and staying inside hard-to-reach, tight, risky and deep sites inside our body. This talk reports medical applications of our novel milli- and microscale wireless miniature medical devices and robots down to cell size that could achieve various minimally invasive medical functions, such as targeted active drug delivery, neural stimulation, clot opening, liquid biopsy, biofluid pumping, cauterization, and hyperthermia. Due to miniaturization limitations on on-board actuation, powering, sensing, computing and communication, new materials and methods need to be introduced in creating and controlling such robots. Moreover, they need to be tracked under medical imaging modalities, such as ultrasound, fluoroscopy, photoacoustic imaging, and MRI, for their precise and safe operation. 3D microprinting and assembly-based fabrication methods and biocompatible and multifunctional soft composites with embedded micro/nanomaterials are proposed to create novel medical milli/microrobots. Soft-bodied medical miniature robot designs enable active shape programming-based adaptive, multimodal and multifunctional navigation and functions, and safe operation.
PROF. DR. METIN SITTI is the President and Professor of Koç University in Istanbul, Turkey since fall 2023. Formerly, he was a Director of the Physical Intelligence Department at Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, Germany (2014-2023), Professor at ETH Zurich, Switzerland (2020-2024), Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, USA (2002-2014), and Research Scientist at UC Berkeley, USA (1999-2002). He received his BSc (1992) and MSc (1994) degrees in electrical and electronics engineering from Boğaziçi Univ., Turkey, and PhD in EE from U. Tokyo (1999).
