Autonomous Robot Does Heart Surgery

Wired Magazine's selection of How to Survive a Robot Uprising for a Rave award was just in time. Today's "news from the future" comes from Italy, where for the first time, a robot performed heart surgery without human intervention.

The operation was initiated and monitored on a PC in Boston, USA, by Carlo Pappone, head of Arrhythmia and Cardiac Electrophysiology at Milan's San Raffaele university. Also watching the operation - a world first - were dozens of heart specialists attending an international congress on arrhythmia in the American city...

 

The Italian expert has used the robot surgeon for at least 40 previous operations, some of which have been described in detail in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. The novelty of this latest experience is that the robot was able to conduct the entire procedure by itself. In the past it needed specific orders from its operator along the way.

[via Dave Farber's IP List]