The 3D endoscope and three surgical instruments of the SHURUI single-port surgical robot can accessed a surgical site via a 2.5cm diameter multi-channel trocar. Then treatments can be performed via one single skin incision, achieving precise surgical operations as well as potentially offering advantages such as reduced trauma, reduced blood loss, fast postoperative recovery, less pain, and minimal prognostic scarring. The SHURUI single-port surgical robot has completed multiple international pioneering surgical paradigms, including the world’s first single-port totally robotic distal gastrectomy (Billroth I anastomosis) and the world's first single-port robotic total gastrectomy for advanced gastric cancer (see “Pioneering Surgeries”). In the completed clinical trials, the SHURUI single-port robot has demonstrated excellent performance, accomplishing surgeries for various indications using a single access port, thus further reducing the patient’s trauma with satisfactory postoperative recovery.

The surgical instruments and the 3D endoscope of the SHURUI single-port robot employ the independently developed “actuation and control technology for deformable continuum mechanism”, which offers advantages of a wide range of motions, strong payload capacity, and high reliability. The 3D endoscope can bend in different directions, providing a wide field-of-view, clear and vivid imaging, and excellent color reproduction.

The teleoperation paradigm involves the surgeon manipulating the haptic masters, which control the surgical instrument’s end-effector to reproduce the operator’s hand movements. To address the motion-from-deformation characteristics of the snake-like surgical instrument, Beijing Surgerii Robotics Co., Ltd. has independently developed the key teleoperation algorithm and the distributed control system based on the heterogeneous topology entities from serial rigid linkage to deformable continuum mechanism, achieving precise, intuitive, and responsive user experiences. Within the magnified 3D immersive view, surgeries can be conducted with meticulous details. Surgeons can also set different scaling ratios for the teleoperation motion, enhancing the precision of surgical operations when necessary, avoiding unintended damages and reducing postoperative recovery time and hospital stay.

The SHURUI single-port robot’s surgical instrument adopts a highly redundant layout of structural backbones, ensuring that the motion capability remains unaffected even if a single structural backbone fractures. The system design is based on two sets of independent hardware construction to achieve full-state safety monitoring, and continuous motion monitoring based on whole-process risk management. The system integrates multiple levels of safety monitoring mechanisms and emergency process control plans to ensure safety at all stages of a surgery. Furthermore, the flexible stem of the surgical instrument has sufficient motion capability in the patient’s body during surgery, while the positioning robotic arms outside the patient body can remain stationary, completely avoiding the risk of collision among the robotic arms, further enhancing the system’s safety.