An approach for robot-assisted biosensing: Demonstration with MRI-guided MR spectroscopy

Emerging and established methods, such as optical imaging and MR spectroscopy (MRS), offer new opportunities for in situ biosensing. The limited tissue penetration of these modalities can be addressed by locally placing the sensor via minimally invasive trans-needle or trans-catheter access. This work introduces a generic system that mechanically scans an area of interest with a sensor, capable of generating 1D scans while registering them to a guiding modality. Computer simulations illustrate the operation of this approach for a miniature RF coil as the mechanically scanned biosensor. Experimental studies demonstrated the approach on phantoms, using MRI as the guiding modality, and an MR-compatible manipulator, which carried a miniature RF coil, was used to scan and collect MRS and generated 1D MRS scans co-registered to the guiding MRI.