• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.66-71
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• 2007

Development of a locomotive mechanism for the capsule type endoscopes will largely enhance their ability to diagnose disease of digestive organs. As a part of it, there should be provided a detection device of their position in human organs for the purpose of observation and motion control. In this paper, a permanent magnet outside human body was employed to project magnetic field on a capsule type endoscope, while its position dependent flux density was measured by three hall-effect sensors which were orthogonally installed inside the capsule. In order to detect the 2-D position data of the capsule with three hall-effect sensors including the roll, pitch and yaw angle, the permanent magnet was extra translated during the measurement. In this way, the 2-D coordinates and three rotation angles of a capsule endoscope on the same motion plane with the permanent magnet could be detected. The working principle and performance test results of the capsule position detection device were introduced in this paper showing that they could be also applied to 6-DOF position detection.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2005.06a
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• pp.1068-1073
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• 2005

Development of a locomotive mechanism for the capsule type endoscopes will largely enhance the ability to diagnose disease of digestive organs. In connection with it, most of the researches have focused on an installable locomotive mechanism in the capsule. In this paper, it is introduced that the movement of a capsule type endoscope in digestive organ can be manipulated by magnetic force produced outside human body. Since the magnetic force is provided by permanent magnets, no additional power supply to the capsule is required. Using a robotic manipulator for locating the external magnet, the capsule motion control system can cover the whole human digestive organs. This study is particularly concentrated on dither motion effect to improve the mobility of capsule type endoscope. It was experimentally found out that the friction coefficient between the capsule and digestive organ can be remarkably reduced by superposing yawing or rolling dither motion on the translatory motion. In this paper, the experimental results obtained while the direction, amplitude and frequency of sinusoidal dither motion were changed are reported.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.25 no.6
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• pp.447-453
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• 2004

In the case of a capsule that can acquire and transmit images from the intestines, the size of the module and the battery capacity in the capsule are subject to restriction. The capsule must be swallowable and the battery must maintain the stable power during the capsule travels in the gastrointestinal tract. Therefore, it is important to control the endoscope using bi-directional wireless communication. In this study, encoder and decoder CPLD modules for bi-directional capsule endoscopes were designed and implemented. The designed controller for capsule endoscope can transmit the images of GI-track from inside to outside of the body and the capsules can be controlled by external controller simultaneously. The designed and implemented controller was verified by an in-vivo animal experiments. From these experiments, it was verified that the CPLD module for bi-directional capsule endoscope satisfied the design specifications.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2001.04a
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• pp.854-857
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• 2001

At present, colonoscopy is performed by means of quite long and flexible endoscopes and controlled manually. Although the flexibility of the distal tip allows the endoscope to follow the tortuous path of the colon, the insertion of the endoscope requires the endoscopist to exert forces on and to perform rotations of the proximal end; these actions cause discomfort to the patient. Though self-propelling colonoscopic systems has been suggested to overcome these problems, it is difficult to pass through highly curved regions of the intestine. In this paper, we introduce a steering mechanism for a self-propelling coloinlscope, the smart capsule, which has three actuator units. The mechanism is designed not only to move forward and backward but also to pass through the curved regions. We derived the governing equations of this mechanism. Active movements and motion control are developed.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2008

Recently, capsule endoscope was developed to observe small intestine in human body. However, the capsule does not have any locomotive ability, which reduces the benefit of the capsule endoscope. Many researches have done to give locomotion to the capsule, still it consumes too much power to generate the motion by small battery. One of the moving method is electrical stimulus that consumes less power than many methods. The electrical stimulus method causes contraction in the small intestine, and it moves the capsule. Some of papers showed it is possible to guide the capsule by electrical stimulus, however the relationship between electrical stimulus at the mucous and contraction force in the small intestine is not reported, yet. In this paper, the mucous in the small intestine was stimulated, and measured the contraction force in the small intestine is shown. The result shows, the relationship between electrical stimulus parameters (voltage, duration) and contraction force. Also, equation between electrical stimulus parameters and contraction force is roughly induced.

• The Journal of Korean Institute of Communications and Information Sciences
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• v.37 no.4C
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• pp.329-337
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• 2012

Capsule Endoscope(CE) is a capsule-shaped electronic device which can examine the lesions in digestive tract of human body. Recently the medical procedure using capsule endoscope is receiving great attention to both doctors and patients, since the conventional push-typed endoscope using cables brings great pain and fear to the patients. The technique was firstly available in 2000 and is based on a convergence techniques among BT(Bio Technology), IT(Information Technology), and NT(Nano Technology). The device consists of an optical parts including LEDs(Light Emitting Diodes), an image sensor, a communication module and a power module. Capsule endoscope is the embodiment of the state-of-the art technology and requires key technologies in the various engineering fields. Therefore, in this paper, we introduce the composition of the capsule endoscope system, and compare the communication method between RF(Radio Frequency) communication and HBC(Human Body Communication), which are typically used for data transmission in the capsule endoscope. Furthermore, we analyze the specification of commercialized capsule endoscopes and present the future developments and technical challenges.

• Proceedings of the IEEK Conference
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• 2003.11c
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• pp.81-85
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• 2003

The Bi-directional Wireless Capsule endoscope con sists of CMOS Image sensor, FPGA, LED, Battery, DC to DC Converter, Transmitter, Receiver and Antennas. The RF transmitter at 1.2GHz range is designed and fabricated with 10 mm(diameter)x1.6 mm(thickness) dimension considering the maximum permission exposure(MPE), system size, power consumption, linearity and modulation method. The fabricated RF receiver at 400MHz range can demodulate the external signals so as to control the behavior of CMOS image sensor. four LEDs and Transmitter.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2001.04a
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• pp.839-843
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• 2001

For robotic endoscope, some researchers suggest pneumatic actuators based on inchworm motion. But, the existing endoscopes are not seemed to be replaced completely because human intestine is very sensitive and susceptible to damage. We design and test a new locomotion of robotic endoscope able to maneuver safely in the human intestine. The actuating mechanism is composed of two solenoids at each side and a single permanent magnet. When the current direction is reversed, repulsive force and attractive at the opposition side propels permanent magnet. Impact force against robotic endoscope transfer momentum from moving magnet to endoscope capsule. The direction and moving speed of the actuator can be controlled by adjusting impact force. Modeling and simulation experiments are carried out to predict the performance of the actuator. Simulation experiments show that force profile of permanent magnet is the dominant factor for the characteristic of the actuator. The results of simulations are verified by comparing with the experimental results.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.26 no.7
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• pp.1438-1445
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• 2002

For robotic endoscope, some researchers suggest pneumatic actuators based on inchworm motion. But, the existing endoscopes have not been replaced completely because human intestine is very sensitive and susceptible to damage. We design and test a new locomotion of robotic endoscope that allows safe maneuverability in the human intestine. The actuating mechanism is composed of two solenoids at each side and a single permanent magnet. When the current direction is reversed, repulsive force and attractive at the opposition side propels permanent magnet. Impact force against robotic endoscope transfers momentum from moving magnet to endoscope capsule. The direction and moving speed of the actuator can be controlled by adjustment of impact force. Modeling and simulation experiments are carried out to predict the performance of the actuator. Simulations show that force profile of permanent magnet is the dominant factor for the characteristic of the actuator. The results of simulations are verified by comparing with the experimental results.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2003.06a
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• pp.1422-1425
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• 2003

In the design of optical system, important variables of optical system (including indices, shapes, spaces, stops. etc.) must manipulate in order to balance out offensive aberration. In this paper, it carried out a basic study on the design of micro optical system usable for the acquaintance of visual information in the particular conditions such as capsule type endoscopes. In this study, specification for design of optical system selected voluntarily and the basic design of optical system carried out by using the ray tracing method on the assumption that ideal lenses without aberrations. In the designed optical system, the optimization including aberration correction and the performance evaluation of optical system carried out by using the CODE-V. The final designed optical system consists of seven sheets of lenses. Also the results of performance evaluation. the micro optical system combined with aspherical lenses was confirmed to have improved optical performance as compared with the micro optical system consisted of spherical lenses.