Institut Teknologi Bandung

The 2020 Medical Robotics for Contagious Disease Challenge (MRCDC) is a competition held by the UK Robotics and Autonomous Systems (UK-RAS) Network. The competition aims to seek robotics innovations to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic, infectious diseases, and other pandemics in the future.

First, the participants are asked to send a two-minute video related to cases and their proposed solutions. Each video was judged based on innovation, relevance to clinical needs, engineering. There are 21 teams from 13 countries that participated in this competition and were reduced to 17 teams.

There are three categories of winners (runner-up and winner) in this competition, namely the best application (best application), best innovation (best innovation), and best design (best design).

"ITB Team presented a video, titled 'Towards Affordable Soft Robotic Bronchoscopy'. It made us get the runner-up of best innovation (best-innovation runner up)," Vani Virdyawan, one of the ITB Team members, said.

The ITB Teams conducted a brainstorming with Imperial College London (ICL). ITB and ICL made a bond to do knowledge transfer by doing joint research of soft robots.

Vani explained that a bronchoscope is a tool used to examine the respiratory tract.

This idea is derived from health workers who have to use Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) every day.

Vani Virdyawan said that the concept is unlike robot concepts in general that are made from rigid components. Soft robots are made with soft materials such as silicon at an affordable price ( 1 kg of silicon is around Rp. 800,000.00).

Meanwhile, to make a soft robot, it only needs about 2-3 grams of silicon. Also, silicon is a biocompatible material and is very suitable for medical uses. Also, advances in rapid prototyping (3D printers) have made the process of making soft robot molds more affordable.

The team also proposed innovations in soft robot driving methods and robot control methods to predict the applied force's magnitude. ITB team hopes that there will be a flexible bronchoscope system at an affordable price in Indonesia in the future.

"Currently our idea is still in the early prototype stage (Technology Readiness Stage (TKT/TRL) 3). To be applied in society, it still requires a fairly long research stage (maybe it will take another 5-10 years). However, we hope that the mastery of technology in soft robots and medical devices can improve the capabilities of the health equipment industry in Indonesia in the future," Vani concluded.

He added that the ITB team's next strategy is to continue collaborative research activities, seek sources of research funding from both domestic and foreign, and collaborate with clinicians and industry.

ITB Team:
1. Vani Virdyawan, lecturer in Mechanical Engineering ITB (while participating in the competition, he was a postdoctoral research associate at MIMLAB)
2. Prof. Andi Isra Mahyuddin, lecturer in Mechanical Engineering ITB
3. Indrawanto, lecturer in Mechanical Engineering ITB
4. Arif Sugiharto, lecturer in Mechanical Engineering ITB
5. Tutla Ayatullah, ITB Mechanical Engineering master student
Imperial College London (ICL) Team:
1. Prof. Ferdinando Rodriguez y Baena, Professor at MIMLAB
2. Prof. Alessandro Astolfi, Professor in the Control and Power Research Group, Imperial College London
3. Enrico Franco, a postdoctoral research associate at MIMLAB
4. Arnau Garriga Casanovas, a postdoctoral research associate at MIMLAB
5. Eloise Matheson, PhD candidate at MIMLAB

Reporter: Christopher Wijaya (Pharmaceutical Science and Technology, 2016)
Translator : Billy Akbar Prabowo (Metallurgical Engineering 2020)