Visual Modelling and Rendering for Virtual Reality Based Surgical Simulation

基于虚拟现实的手术模拟的视觉建模和渲染

• 批准号: RGPIN-2021-04193
• 负责人: Liu, Peter
• 金额: $ 2.84万
• 依托单位: Carleton University
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2021-01-01 至 2022-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=742919
• 关键词: Visual; Modelling; Rendering; Virtual; Reality

The lack of effective methods and tools for surgical training has been a long-standing problem in medical education. Current approaches exhibit various limitations and drawbacks: animals have different anatomies from humans; cadavers are unable to provide physiological responses; it is risky for surgical residents to practice on patients. A recent CBC report shows that a great percentage of Canadian surgical residents do not demonstrate basic hands-on skills and manual dexterity.     Because of its many unique advantages, virtual-reality based surgical simulators are increasingly regarded as a promising solution to the current predicament, representing next-generation paradigm for surgical training. A surgical simulator is able to generate virtual patients with human anatomy and physiological responses, providing a risk-free training environment. In addition to these obvious benefits, surgery residents can practice on a wide range of pathological states with unlimited times; new complex surgical procedures can be tried safely on a surgical simulator before proceeding to patients.     Current surgical simulators, however, are still in their infancy and there exist numerous technical challenges and difficulties. In particular, no simulator is able to provide a sufficiently high degree of visual resemblance to real-life surgery. Aiming at solving this problem, this proposal will deal with some key issues about the visual feedback of surgical simulation: physical modelling (i.e., the modelling of soft tissue's biomechanical properties), geometric modelling (the modelling of soft tissue's deformation) and visual rendering. The anticipated results will be implemented and validated in the development of a neurosurgery simulator prototype.     The long-term goal is to develop principles, algorithms and tools that are essential to realize highly realistic and naturalistic visual feedback for surgical simulation, enabling educational institutions and hospitals to train surgeons (particularly neurosurgeons) using virtual-reality based simulators. To achieve this goal, specific research objectives are as follows:     - To develop suitable models to incorporate anisotropic, viscoelastic and physiological features, improving the modelling accuracy of the physical (biomechanical) properties of human soft tissue;     - To explore to extract the biomechanical parameters of human soft tissue using CT and/or MRI images, addressing the dilemma due to various difficulties associated with current methods;     - To develop a meshless approach to geometric models for the deformation of human soft tissue;     - To develop rendering methods to mix/integrate seamlessly simulated surgical scenes with real surgical video as the background, achieving high degree of visual immersion;      - To apply anticipated results to develop a new neurosurgery simulator in collaboration with the industrial partner and clinical practitioner.

缺乏有效的手术培训方法和工具一直是医学教育的长期问题。当前的方法表现出各种局限性和缺点：动物与人类具有不同的解剖学；尸体无法提供身体反应；外科居民有危险对患者进行练习。 CBC最近的一份报告显示，大部分加拿大外科居民没有表现出基本的动手技能和手动灵活性。由于其许多独特的优势，越来越多地将基于虚拟的手术模拟器视为对当前预测的有望解决方案，代表了手术训练的下一代范式。手术模拟器能够产生具有人体解剖结构和身体反应的虚拟患者，从而提供无风险的训练环境。除了这些明显的好处外，手术居民还可以在无限时间的各种病理状态下进行练习；在进行患者之前，可以在手术模拟器上安全地尝试新的复杂手术程序。但是，目前的手术模拟器仍处于起步阶段，并且存在许多技术挑战和困难。特别是，没有模拟器能够提供与现实生活手术的足够高度相似之处。为了解决此问题，该建议将处理有关手术模拟的视觉反馈的一些关键问题：物理建模（即软组织的生物力学特性的建模），几何建模（软组织变形的建模）和视觉渲染。预期的结果将在神经外科模拟器原型的开发中实施和验证。长期目标是开发对手术模拟现实和自然主义的视觉反馈至关重要的原则，算法和工具，使教育机构和医院能够使用基于虚拟现实的模拟器来培训外科医生（尤其是神经外科医生）。为了实现这一目标，特定的研究目标如下： - 开发合适的模型以结合各向异性，粘弹性和物理特征，从而提高了人类软组织的物理（生物力学）特性的建模精度； - 探索使用CT和/或MRI图像提取人软组织的生物力学参数，以解决由于与当前方法相关的各种困难而解决的困境； - 开发一种无网格的方法来形成人类软组织的变形； - 开发渲染方法，将无缝模拟的外科手术场景与真实的手术视频混合在一起，以实现高度的视觉浸入； - 应用预期的结果与工业合作伙伴和临床从业人员合作开发新的神经外科模拟器。