US Patent Issued to INTUITIVE SURGICAL OPERATIONS on June 3 for "Surgical instrument with shiftable transmission" (California, Tennessee Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 4 -- United States Patent no. 12,318,155, issued on June 3, was assigned to INTUITIVE SURGICAL OPERATIONS INC. (Sunnyvale, Calif.).

"Surgical instrument with shiftable transmission" was invented by David W. Bailey (Portola Valley, Calif.), Gabriel F. Brisson (Sunnyvale, Calif.), Rumen Deyanov (Fremont, Calif.), Ray Lathrop (Nashville, Tenn.) and Theodore W. Rogers (Alameda, Calif.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A surgical tool having an elongated shaft having a proximal end and distal end. A surgical end effector is located about the distal end. The surgical end effector has a plurality of effector mechanisms comprising a plurality of degree of freedoms. An effector body...