Abstract: A system and method for damped manipulation of a medical tool is disclosed. The system includes a robotic arm and a control unit. The robotic arm includes one or more links and one or more joints that cooperate to move the medical tool. The control unit is configured to receive a position and a velocity of a first joint of the one or more joints, apply a damping function to the first joint based on the received position or velocity to modify a force or torque of the first joint, and vary the damping function applied to the first joint based on the position or velocity when the position or velocity changes while the medical tool is moved.

Abstract: A system and method for variable damping of a hand-controlled input device, thereby providing damped control of a medical tool (e.g., for teleoperation), is disclosed. The system includes a robotic user interface and a control unit for applying different variable damping coefficients to the robotic user interface based on one or more variables. The robotic user interface includes one or more links and one or more joints that cooperate to facilitate remote manipulation of a medical tool. The control unit is configured to receive motion information from the one or more joints, determine a damping modifier from a plurality of different damping modifiers based on the received motion information, apply the determined damping modifier to at least one joint of the one or more joints to modify a force or torque of the at least one joint during a manipulation of the medical tool.

Abstract: A medical system may include an input device for controlling a medical instrument. The input device may include a grasper for receiving user input and a sensor coupled to the grasper for generating sensor information related to a user presence at the grasper. The medical system may also include a processor and memory that stores instructions for receiving secondary information associated with the grasper and determining a user presence at the grasper based on the sensor information and the secondary information. A method for operating the medical system with the input device is also disclosed herein.