Case Study: Worcester Polytechnic Institute achieves modular MRI robot control with National Instruments CompactRIO

Enhanced Cancer Interventions With Modular Control of MRI Robots

Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) faced the challenge of creating an MRI-safe control system for surgical robots. Because MRI machines are highly sensitive to electromagnetic interference (EMI), WPI needed a low-noise, modular system to enable precise, closed-loop instrument delivery for enhanced cancer interventions.

National Instruments provided the solution with its NI CompactRIO device and LabVIEW software. This allowed WPI to develop a reliable, modular motion control system that interfaces with custom hardware. The result is a versatile controller now used for two different MRI robots: one for ablating brain tumors, now in animal trials, and another for targeted prostate biopsies, which has already been used in a 30-patient clinical trial.

Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Paulo Carvalho

Worcester Polytechnic Institute