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The world of technology is rapidly changing from viewing flat media in the 3rd person to viewing it in the first person. A new wave of excitement has arisen over the core technologies of virtual and augmented reality as a result of the metaverse. Telepresence will become an important part of the metaverse because it is often overlooked.
Telepresence, also known as telerobotics, uses remote robots to bring users to distant places and give them the ability to look around and perform complex tasks.
I know that sounds crazy, but a startup company in California has created a tiny robot that can crawl through the bowels of humans. I had a chance to talk to the CEO of Endiatx about their technology and vision. Let's jump back in time a few decades to understand why their breakthrough strikes me as such an unexpected advancement.
Thirty years ago, I had my first experience with tele robotic systems. I remember the first time I peered into a headset, grabbing a set of periscope-like handles, and looking around a room that wasn't the one I was in. There were some of the first prototypes of a mobile telerobotic system that I worked on at NASA. It allowed you to control a mobile robot with a camera system that sent back pictures in real time. The state of the art in telepresence research was shown in a photo from an academic paper.
Register HereThe system was developed by some of the top researchers in the field. If you wanted to bring the hardware to a trade show, you would need a van or truck. The idea of a small system that a person could swallow and be controlled by a doctor was not feasible.
To clean up nuclear accidents, repair satellites, and fix leaking oil wells were some of the things that the focus was on early on. This was cutting-edge research back then, but I didn't think it was a good idea to shrink the technology to such a size that it could be used to diagnose and treat patients from the inside.
The recent technical success of the team at Endiatx surprised me. Their prototype system is a tiny remote-controlled submarine that can be swallowed by humans and piloted into the stomach and other parts of the temporomandibular joint. They have run tests on dead and living people.
He told me that he has been thinking about the concept of Innerspace ever since he saw the movie as a kid. He founded Endiatx a few years ago to bring this idea to fruition. His company is going to bring this capability to healthcare as a shipping product, and he was the first person on the planet to have a robot fly around in his stomach. The first prototype that made a great voyage was swallowed by him.
Since that initial test, others at the company have swallowed working prototypes many times, capturing live video of the type that will one day be used to screen patients for various diseases. The team is currently conducting tests with doctors at the Mayo Clinic and is planning trials for the FDA. The PillBot could be able to diagnose patients by 2024.
For people with stomach pain, this could be a huge benefit. The tiny swallowable robot could be used instead of a standard endoscopy procedure, which involves multiple visits and can take a long time. It's possible that it will provide more flexibility than a traditional endoscope, as the Pillbot has full 3D mobility of a tiny robot submarine. It looks like a tiny sub with a video camera, battery, and wireless link for sending images to doctors in real-time.
Doctors can fly the tiny drone using a standard xbox controller, but the company plans to enable control using the touchscreen of any mobile phone. Their vision is for a disposable unit that is shipped to your home and swallowed during a consultation with your doctor, who will review the camera feed from their PC or phone. Endiatx believes it can make robotic pills for $25 each and sell them for hundreds of dollars per unit to save thousands of dollars in medical expenses. The company believes that PillBots will save many lives by enabling faster and cheaper screening that finds serious conditions sooner.
The first clinical trials are expected to start later this year, followed by an in-clinic version and then an at- home version.
I wasn't sure about the telemedicine angle for a tiny robot like this, as we're talking about a powerful diagnostic tool delivered in the mail Will the medical profession accept such a change or will they insist on keeping it? The press release announcing the acquisition of One Medical by Amazon stated that the company wants to change the healthcare experience.
Neil Lindsay is quoted in the release as saying, "Booking an appointment, waiting weeks or even months to be seen, taking time off work, driving to a clinic, finding a parking spot, waiting in the waiting room then the exam room for what is too often a rushed appointment is something
The sci-fi vision of tiny drones that are swallowed by patients and controlled remotely by doctors could become part of our mainstream medical experience.
The author is a pioneer in the field of virtual reality, augmented reality and artificial intelligence. He developed the first functional mixed reality system in the 1980's. He founded the first virtual reality and augmented reality companies. He is the CEO of a company that improves the intelligence of humans. Over 300 patents have been awarded for his work in virtual reality, augmented reality, and artificial intelligence.
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