Bert Willaert
Papers
7
Total Citations
93
H-Index
5
About
Bert Willaert’s research lies at the intersection of surgical robotics, haptics, and physical human-robot interaction, with a focus on making minimally invasive surgery safer and more intuitive. His most influential work, “*In vivo* soft tissue damage assessment for applications in surgery” (36 citations), introduced the concept of imposing damage thresholds on surgical instruments to prevent tissue overload—a foundational idea for improving patient safety in both robotic and conventional surgery. Willaert also made key contributions to model-mediated teleoperation, demonstrating stability solutions that enhance transparency and stiffness reflection in telesurgery (27 citations). His constraint-based programming approach to physical human-robot interaction (10 citations) extended the iTaSC formalism to scenarios like surgical and rehabilitation robotics, enabling safer collaboration between humans and robots. Beyond theory, he designed a multi-purpose haptic device (6 citations) to support research on physical human-robot interaction, and developed an extracorporeal force measurement system for robot-assisted MIS with 3D force feedback (5 citations). Willaert’s work bridges the gap between haptic control theory and practical surgical applications, with his damage assessment and teleoperation studies remaining highly cited for their direct impact on reducing collateral tissue damage and improving haptic feedback in telesurgery.
Research Focus
Key Achievements
Top Papers
- 1<i>In vivo</i> soft tissue damage assessment for applications in surgery36 citations · 2010
- 2Stability of Model-Mediated Teleoperation: Discussion and Experiments27 citations · 2012
- 3A constraint-based programming approach to physical human-robot interaction10 citations · 2012
- 4Transparent and Shaped Stiffness Reflection for Telesurgery7 citations · 2010
- 5
- 6
- 7Teleoperation in Presence of Uncertainties: a Constraint-Based Approach2 citations · 2012