The first-ever space surgery robot has completed its debut simulated procedure aboard the International Space Station (ISS). On Feb. 10—less than two weeks after arriving in space—surgeons here on Earth could conduct a mock surgery, slicing delicately through rubber bands from hundreds of miles away. The simple yet successful test is a glimmer of hope for astronauts on board the ISS, where direct medical attention is scarce.
SpaceMIRA, a “miniaturized in vivo robotic assistant,” was designed by engineers at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the robotics company Virtual Incision (a spinoff startup founded by UNL faculty). In 2022, the robot emerged from nearly two decades of Earthbound development and mock surgical testing and prepared for spaceflight using zero-gravity experimentation. Once SpaceMIRA proved capable of withstanding the harsh conditions associated with the launch, it was scheduled to hitch a ride to space via Northrop Grumman's Cygnus spacecraft on Jan. 30, 2024.
SpaceMIRA “looks a bit like an oversized stick blender,” according to the team at UNL. The 2-pound, 30-inch device has two arms fitted with a gripper and scissors. As a surgeon controls SpaceMIRA from afar, an integrated articulating camera enables the surgeon to pivot their field of view.
Michael Jobst, a colorectal surgeon, and Dmitry Oleynikov, a former gastrointestinal and bariatric surgeon who now works for Virtual Incision, made SpaceMIRA’s first cuts in space. As SpaceMIRA sat on a rack in the US Destiny laboratory module, Jobst directed the robot’s scissor arm toward an array of rubber bands pulled taut over metal panels. The surgeon snipped each rubber band as directed, successfully mimicking one form of incision made during conventional surgery.
While robotic-assisted surgery isn’t new, remote surgical consoles on Earth are typically controlled by surgeons inside the same room. Then, operating such a console from a different orbiting object is an unusual challenge. As surgeons controlled SpaceMIRA from Virtual Incision's headquarters in Lincoln, Nebraska, they experienced delays ranging from two-thirds to three-quarters of a second. Still, they were able to compensate for the lag somewhat easily.
“You have to wait a little bit for the movement to happen. It’s definitely slower movements than you’re used to in the operating room,” Jobst told UNL.
SpaceMIRA’s first test aboard the ISS was simple. It will be some time before medical professionals will leverage SpaceMIRA—or a similar robot—to perform actual surgeries on astronauts. But until then, SpaceMIRA’s initial success proves it’s possible to conduct delicate medical procedures from extremely remote locations, whether here on Earth or in space.
