Endoscopic surgery has used tubes for years, but now Japanese researchers have built a probe that can swim through the digestive tract:
Robots roaming freely through the human body. What could possibly go wrong?
Link -via Geekosystem | Photo: AFP/Jiji Press
The device, nicknamed the "Mermaid", is about one centimetre (0.4 inches) in diameter and 4.5 (1.8 inches) long and has magnetic driving gear that allows for precise control of its direction and location.
Doctors use a joystick to control the capsule's movements, watching them on a monitor screen. It can be swallowed for examination of the stomach or inserted rectally for the colon.
Robots roaming freely through the human body. What could possibly go wrong?
Link -via Geekosystem | Photo: AFP/Jiji Press
If nothing is found through the rectal route, they repeat the test via the oral route. That's my dad's joke.
But until it can also take tissue samples, it's not likely to be used much.