US Patent Issued to INTUITIVE SURGICAL OPERATIONS on June 23 for "Inter-operative switching of tools in a robotic surgical system" (California Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 15 -- United States Patent no. 12,661,198, issued on June 23, was assigned to INTUITIVE SURGICAL OPERATIONS INC. (Sunnyvale, Calif.).

"Inter-operative switching of tools in a robotic surgical system" was invented by Niels Smaby (Palo Alto, Calif.), Gregory W. Dachs II (San Mateo, Calif.), Nicola Diolaiti (Menlo Park, Calif.), Pushkar Hingwe (Los Altos, Calif.), Thomas R. Nixon (San Jose, Calif.), Bruce M. Schena (Menlo Park, Calif.) and Nitish Swarup (Sunnyvale, Calif.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "Teleoperated control includes commanding, in response to a first input to move a tool while an imaging device is mounted to a first manipulator and a tool is mounted to a sec...