[IGSTK-Developers] Notes from the MICCAI Workshop on Systems and Architectures for Computer Aided Intervention

[Luis Ibanez]

The MICCAI Workshop on Systems and Architectures for Computer Aided
Intervention took place on Saturday Sept 6th.

        http://smarts.lcsr.jhu.edu/CAI-Workshop-2008
        http://miccai2008.rutgers.edu/workshops/index.html

Congratulations to Peter Kazanzides and Nobi Hata, who succeeded in
bringing together participants from industry and academia.

It was very refreshing to participate in a session where people were
looking at forms of working together for the advancement of the field,
instead of the traditional effort for simply trying to prove that what
they do at their institutions is better than anything else.

Please find below the notes that I took during the session.

They are rather sparse, and they are not intended to be a comprehensive
summary at all of what was presented. There are plans for collectively
writing a white paper describing the discussions that took place during
this Workshop.


-----

A) Presentation from Industry


Open Interfaces:


A.1) Medtronics

      Stealth stations provide the communication protocol StealthLink
      to allow the passing of information to research stations. The use
      of StealthLink can be negotiated with Medtronics, and the most
      significant part of the agreement is intendeed to clarify the
      potential liabilities of its use.

      StealLinkII is currently under development, and it may include
      an interface to IGSTK or OpenIGTLink.

      Medtronics also has an Award program for providing Stealth stations
      on loan to specific students, to use them for research purposes.


A.2) Intuitive Surgical

      Presented the interface to the The daVinci robot.

      - This is an output-only interface, based on Ethernet and TCP/IP.
      - It includes documentation about the DaVinci kinematics
      - Examples of source code for (Linux and Windows)
      - Researchers interested in this interface must reach an agreement
        with Intuitive Surgical that state the terms of liabilities,
        and non-disclosure agreements.


A.3) Claron Technologies

      Described the open interface to the MicronTracker, and the set of
      C++ classes that are provided (under a BSD-like) license to make
      easier for developers to interface their applications to the
      MicronTracker.


A.4) BrainLab / Yale University (VVLink)

      Presented the VectorVision Link (aka VVLink) for which three
      levels of packaging are available, under a consulting agreement
      with BrainLab. This link makes possible to move information out
      of the BrainLab hardward, mostly with the purpose of coupling
      their systems with research stations.

      VVLink was originally developed as a MSc Thesis at Yale, and
      originally for the BioImage suite, transfering point coordinates
      and images out.

      VVLink is based on VTK and relies extensively on VTK classes, in
      particular for data structures and for communication. vtkMatrix4x4,
      vtkImage, vtkLookUpTable..)

      VVLink is closed source, and was considered a very positive
      experience.

      There are current efforts for building a bridge between VVLink and
      OpenIGTLink.

      The importance of License, Operating Systems and Programming
      Language was highlighted as a necessary requirement for making
      sure that a "link" can be widely adopted.


------------------

B) Open Source Tools

B.1) Open Source Initiative for Robot Toolkit (in Japan)
      by Kiyo Chinzei, AIST

      Highlighted the fact that a toolkit is not just "software"
      but that instead, it encompases:

       - Software
       - Development tools
       - Community

      It also emphasized the testing *must* include Hardware testing.


B.2) Open source medical robotics and interface to the Da Vinci Robot

      JHU, Intuitive Surgical

      A framework that provides "virtual fixtures": e.g. virtual
      boundaries overlapped to the image displayed to the surgeon.
      Based on VTK 3D and 2D Widgets.

      Introductin of a "Behavior manager", using separte thread per
      "behavior".

      Support for video processing, using VTK for video visualization.

      Highlighted the importance of research on "user interaction",
      for example, pointed out that when users click on a mouse, that
      clicking gestures changes the X,Y position of the mouse pointer.

      Expected released of the framework:  December 2008.


B.3) OpenIGTLink

      Described the principles of OpenIGTLink, the data formats,
      and how it can be used as a common communication protocol
      among multiple vendors and open source tools.

      It included a very nice demo of a OpenIGTLink-based communication
      between an iPhone and 3D Slicer !!!  :-)


B.4) IGSTK

      The contributions of IGSTK to the field were presented
      in terms of:

        - Facilitating reproducibility (in research publishing)
        - Support for education
        - A platform for start-ups

      The basic functionalities of IGSTK were described.



-------


During the open discussions, it was proposed to setup some basic
community building tools, like a mailing-list and a Wiki for this
very specific IGT/IGS/CAI community.



     Luis