19-Jul-2021: Scientists Develop Novel & Cheap 3D Robotic Motion Phantom that can Reproduce Human Lung Motion

Doctors in India may soon have the facility to simulate the lung motion of a cancer patient to help deliver focused radiation in the upper abdomen or thoracic region.

Breathing motion is a hurdle for delivering focused radiation dose to the cancer tumour attached to upper abdomen and thoracic regions. The motion exposes an area larger than the tumour to radiation during cancer treatment, thus affecting tissues surrounding the targeted tumour. A focused radiation for a patient could be customised by simulating the lung movement of the particular patient and then orienting the delivery of the radiation so that it can be effective with minimal dosage. Before this is done on a human, its effectiveness needs to be checked on a robotic phantom.

Recent technological development have resulted in state-of-the-art motion management techniques like-gating and tracking. Though there is incremental development in radiation therapy delivery of respiratory moving targets, the quality assurance (QA) tools have not been developed in parallel. For quantitative determination of the absorbed dose in an organ in the patient for a specific type of treatment procedure accuracy of respiratory motion management techniques, additional respiratory motion phantoms are required.

A group of Indian scientists have developed a novel and cheap 3D robotic motion phantom that can reproduce the lung motion of a human during breathing. The phantom is part of a platform not only emulates the human lung motion as a patient is breathing but can also be used to check if the radiation is being correctly focussed on a moving target. The phantom is placed inside a CT scanner on the bed in place of the human, and it emulates human lung motion as it is irradiated during therapy. During irradiation, consistently high-quality images of advanced 4D radiation therapy treatments are obtained with minimum exposure of the patients and workers. Before the targeted radiation is delivered to a human subject, its effectiveness in focusing only on the tumor is checked with this phantom.

Professor Ashish Dutta, Professor at IIT Kanpur, along with Professor K. J. Maria Das, Professor from Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS), Lucknow developed the programmable robotic motion the platform for the quality assurance of respiratory motion management techniques in radiation therapy. 

The major part of the phantom is a dynamic platform over which any dosimetric or imaging quality assurance devices can be placed, and the platform can mimic 3D tumor motion by using three independent stepper-motor systems. This platform is placed on the bed where the patient lays down during radiation therapy. As phantom emulates the lung movement, a moving or gating window is used to focus the radiation from the radiation machine on the moving tumour. Detectors placed in the phantom help detect whether the radiation is localised on the tumour.

The dose effectiveness is checked during therapy. The researchers are in the process of testing the system on a phantom. Once done, they will test it on human beings.

This is the first time in India for manufacturing this type of robotic phantoms, and it is more affordable than other imported products available in the market as the program can be changed to produce different types of lung motion.

The technology developed with support from the Advanced Manufacturing Technologies programme of the Department of Science & Technology (DST), Government of India, and aligned with the ‘Make in India’ initiative is currently under final testing in SGPGIMS, Lucknow.

The innovators are further trying to commercialize the product, which can be used in place of the overseas model that is very much more expensive and does not give access to the control software.

29-Nov-2020: ARTPARK to usher in a new model of industry, academia and government collaboration in AI & Robotics for societal impact

An AI & Robotics Technologies Park (ARTPARK) set up in Bengaluru will promote technology innovations in AI (Artificial Intelligence)& Robotics leading to societal impact by executing ambitious mission mode R&D projects in healthcare, education, mobility, infrastructure, agriculture, retail and cyber-security focusing on problems unique to India.

ARTPARK, is a unique not-for-profit foundation established by Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru with support from AI Foundry in a public-private model. With seed funding of Rs. 170 Cr ($22mn) from Department of Science & Technology(DST), Govt. of India, under the National Mission on Inter-disciplinary Cyber-Physical Systems (NM-ICPS), it will bring about collaborative consortium of partners from industry, academia and government bodies. This will lead to cutting edge innovations in terms of new technologies, standards, products, services and intellectual properties.

"The National Mission ICPS with its 25 Hubs has a unique architecture that envisages a strong collaboration and co-ownership among the triple helix of industry, academia and government with full flexibility. Generous additional support of the Government of Karnataka to the ARTPARK Hub brings extraordinary value in increasing its effectiveness, reach and use. It also sets a template of centre-state partnership in the frontier areas of technology-- a theme which will receive focus in the soon to be released Science, Technology and Innovation Policy 2020", said Professor Ashutosh Sharma, DST Secretary at the launch of the ARTPARK recently.

"Indian academia has been carrying out cutting edge technology research in various domains. However, we have had systemic issues in moving the results of this research from university laboratories into the outside world. ARTPARK would go a long way in establishing a template for addressing this need," Prof. Govindan Rangarajan, Director IISc pointed out.

"These moonshots will not only enable India but also build technology solutions for the 6 bn people in the developing world," Umakant Soni, Co-founder & CEO noted.

ARTPARK will develop AI & Robotics facilities to support technology innovations as well as capacity building through advanced skills training of students and professionals in these areas. Some of these facilities will be key enablers for whole new sets of technologies, products and services. It will develop DataSetu - that will enable confidentiality and privacy-preserving framework to share data and run analytics spurring the data-sharing ecosystem and create a data marketplace, boosting AI applications and solutions.

One such service will be BhashaSetu - that will enable real-time Indic language translation, both of speech to speech and speech to text. This will further unlock the economic potential of the country, and enable all Indian citizens to equitably participate in the economic progress, regardless of their language.

Prof. Bharadwaj Amrutur, Research Head & Director ARTPARK explained how ARTPARK was a natural evolution of the Robert Bosch Centre for Cyber Physical Systems, an interdisciplinary research and academic centre at IISc, with funding from the Bosch group of companies. 

Vishal Dhupar, MD, NVIDIA South Asia, spoke about the collaborations between NVIDIA and ARTPARK to “enable technology to solve humanity's grand challenges".

Robin Sukhia, Secretary-General and President of the Sweden India Business Council pointed out how the not-for-profit organisation will enable international co-creation at a higher and deeper level to help solve today’s and tomorrow’s challenges using technology in a unique way.

ARTPARK, in collaboration with AI foundry, will run a novel ARTPARK Venture Studio that will mentor technopreneurs who will take the outputs of the mission mode projects to launch new startups.