Characterization and in-vivo evaluation of a multi-resolution foveated laparoscope for minimally invasive surgery.

The state-of-the-art laparoscope lacks the ability to capture high-magnification and wide-angle images simultaneously, which introduces challenges when both close- up views for details and wide-angle overviews for orientation are required in clinical practice. A multi-resolution foveated laparoscope (MRFL) which can provide the surgeon both high-magnification close-up and wide-angle images was proposed to address the limitations of the state-of-art surgical laparoscopes. In this paper, we present the overall system design from both clinical and optical system perspectives along with a set of experiments to characterize the optical performances of our prototype system and describe our preliminary in-vivo evaluation of the prototype with a pig model. The experimental results demonstrate that at the optimum working distance of 120mm, the high-magnification probe has a resolution of 6.35lp/mm and image a surgical area of 53 × 40mm(2); the wide-angle probe provides a surgical area coverage of 160 × 120mm(2) with a resolution of 2.83lp/mm. The in-vivo evaluation demonstrates that MRFL has great potential in clinical applications for improving the safety and efficiency of the laparoscopic surgery.