Enhancing the functionality of soft continuum robots for minimally invasive and endoluminal interventions: a review

The introduction and development of soft continuum robots for minimally invasive surgery and endoluminal intervention offers a promising option for navigating delicate, convoluted human anatomy across various procedures. However, successful translation of soft continuum robots from research prototypes through to clinically viable tools relies on overcoming the challenge of functionalization for targeted diagnostic and therapeutic intervention. Functionalization demands specialized design and fabrication strategies to ensure practical integration of operational components, such as stimuli-responsive materials and tip-mounted transducers, with soft bioinspired geometry and actuation mechanisms. This review aims to highlight the state of the art in the development of functionalized soft continuum robots for minimally invasive and endoluminal applications. Drawing on advances over the past twenty-five years, we provide a comprehensive discussion of the innovations to date and of the pivotal clinical and developmental challenges to be overcome for the functionalization, therapeutic benefit and therefore, clinical translation of soft continuum robots. Through developing coherence between the fields of bio-inspired soft robotic design, digitally driven fabrication, materials engineering and intra-operative control, further clinically significant advances may be realized in the domain of functionalized soft continuum robots.