In breast cancer research, the radiologist is looking for suspected lesions using an MRI scan. This MRI scan in cooperation with imaging techniques shows him the spots where those lesions, which are malignant or benign, are. The biopsy is done by inserting a hollow needle in the suspected lesion. A sample is taken from the lesion and extracted for further research. The accuracy of manually doing such a biopsy is relatively low compared to what an automated system can do. Due to this accuracy difference, robots were developed to assist with the biopsy.
The current robot in development is the Sunram 5, the 5th generation, which is a 5DOF robot driven by 6 linear and curved pneumatic stepper motors and 3 cylinders. The aim of the overarching project is to get the Sunram 5 working automatically. In order to obtain an accurate robot, there is a kinematic model needed. This kinematic model determines the needed rotations and translations the motors have to make. This determination should be done by using the requested setpoints of the tip of the needle as inputs. The goal in this assignment is to design a kinematic model of the above described Sunram 5.