Minimally invasive instrument for robotic surgery

Minimally invasive instrument for robotic surgery including a functional element, a force, torque and/or pressure transmission device for transmitting force, torque and/or pressure from a drive to the functional element, a coupling device for coupling the instrument to a medical robot such that the functional element can be actuated by the drive, wherein an operating element for manually operating the functional element in a state in which the instrument is uncoupled from the medical robot.

TISSUE RESECTION APPARATUS

A tissue resection apparatus includes a pair of grasping members that holds a tissue; and a cartridge that is replaceably attached to the pair of grasping members. The cartridge includes a cartridge body that has a longitudinal axis and a slot extending along the longitudinal axis, guides a cutting member cutting a tissue by the slot, and defines a movement range of the cutting member; a pair of sealing portions that are provided on both sides of the slot so as to sandwich the slot and extend parallel to the slot, respectively; and a tissue sealing portion that is located closer to a distal end side than the slot and is provided on an extension line of the slot.

Method and system to determine an optimal tissue compression time to implant a surgical element

A method for determining an optimal compression of tissue to apply a surgical element to the tissue, the method comprising: measuring an initial thickness of the tissue before applying a load to the tissue with a moveable platen; applying the load to the tissue with the moveable platen; measuring a velocity of the moveable platen in response to the load applied to the tissue; providing an audible signal when the velocity of the moveable platen reaches a predetermined velocity which is indicative that about eighty percent tissue compression has been achieved representing optimal compression.

Method and apparatus for determining parameters of linear motion in a surgical instrument

A surgical instrument and method of controlling the surgical instrument are disclosed. The surgical instrument includes a housing and an elongated shaft that extends distally from the housing and defines a first longitudinal axis. The surgical instrument also includes a firing rod disposed in the elongated shaft and a drive mechanism disposed at least partially within the housing. The drive mechanism mechanically cooperates with the firing rod to move the firing rod. A motion sensor senses a change in the electric field (e.g., capacitance, impedance, or admittance) between the firing rod and the elongated shaft. The measurement unit determines a parameter of the motion of the firing rod, such as the position, speed, and direction of the firing rod, based on the sensed change in the electric field. A controller uses the measured parameter of the motion of the firing rod to control the drive mechanism.

Environmental sensing with a doorbell at a smart-home

This patent specification relates to apparatus, systems, methods, and related computer program products for providing home security/smart home objectives. More particularly, this patent specification relates to a plurality of devices, including intelligent, multi-sensing, network-connected devices, that communicate with each other and/or with a central server or a cloud-computing system to provide any of a variety of useful home security/smart home objectives.

Natural language control of secondary device

Natural language controlled devices may be configured to activate command recognition in response to one or more wake words. Techniques are provided to enable a voice controlled system to detect or receive an indication of a secondary device available to be controlled. The voice controlled system communicates with the secondary device to obtain information related to the secondary device. The voice controlled system may output of an audio query requesting audio input data related to controlling the secondary device from a user and generate, based on the requested audio input data, recognition data utilized to recognize of at least part of one or more commands to issue one or more controls to the secondary device.

Procedure for etch rate consistency

Methods of conditioning interior processing chamber walls of an etch chamber are described. A fluorine-containing precursor may be remotely or locally excited in a plasma to treat the interior chamber walls periodically on a preventative maintenance schedule. The treated walls promote an even etch rate when used to perform gas-phase etching of silicon regions following conditioning. Alternatively, a hydrogen-containing precursor may be remotely or locally excited in a plasma to treat the interior chamber walls in embodiments. Regions of exposed silicon may then be etched with more reproducible etch rates from wafer-to-wafer. The silicon etch may be performed using plasma effluents formed from a remotely excited fluorine-containing precursor.

Secure cloud storage distribution and aggregation

Methods and systems for vendor independent and secure cloud storage distribution and aggregation are provided. According to one embodiment, an application programming interface (API) is provided by a cloud storage gateway device logically interposed between third-party cloud storage platforms and users of an enterprise. The API facilitates storing of files, issuing of search requests against the files and retrieval of content of the files. A file storage policy is assigned to each user, which defines access rights, storage diversity requirements and a type of encryption to be applied to files. Responsive to receiving a request to store a file, (i) searchable encrypted data is created relating to content and/or metadata of the file based on the assigned file storage policy; and (ii) the searchable encrypted data is distributed among the third-party cloud storage platforms based on the storage diversity requirements defined by the assigned file storage policy.

Transfer module for bowed wafers

A wafer grinding system includes a robot arm having a suction board at one end and a table within reach of the robot arm. An upper surface of the table has a vacuum surface for sucking and holding wafers. A pusher coupled to the robot arm extends about the periphery of the suction board. The pusher flattens wafers against the upper surface of the table, allowing the table to hold by suction wafers that would otherwise be too bowed to be held in that way. Additionally, a table can have a vacuum area that is small in comparison to the wafers, which is another way of increasing the magnitude of wafer bow that can be tolerated. A grinding system can use the reduced vacuum area concept to allow the positioning table to hold bowed wafers and the pusher concept to allow the chuck tables to hold bowed wafers.

Method for manufacturing heat-resistant composite material

By using chemical vapor deposition or chemical vapor infiltration, silicon carbide is deposited on a preform 100 accommodated in a reaction furnace 11 for film formation, and the amount of additive gas added to raw material gas and carrier gas to be supplied to the reactive furnace 11 is used to control the growth rate and filling uniformity at film formation of silicon carbide. When the film formation of silicon carbide follows a first-order reaction, the amount of added additive gas is used to control the sticking probability of the film-forming species. When the film formation of silicon carbide follows a Langmuir-Hinshelwood rate formula, the amount of added additive gas is used to make a control so that a zero-order reaction region of the Langmuir-Hinshelwood rate formula is used.