US Patent Issued to Covidien on July 8 for "Coupling surgical instruments to robotic surgical systems" (Connecticut Inventor)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 9 -- United States Patent no. 12,350,000, issued on July 8, was assigned to Covidien LP (Mansfield, Mass.).

"Coupling surgical instruments to robotic surgical systems" was invented by Earl Zergiebel (Guilford, Conn.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A robotic surgical system includes a surgical instrument, a robotic arm, and a coupler assembly. The surgical instrument defines a longitudinal axis therethrough and supports an end effector on a free distal end portion of the surgical instrument. The robotic arm includes segments that are movably coupled together by joints. A first joint has at least two degrees of freedom for positioning the surgical instrument relative to a p...