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Education

• 2009 - 2013: Ph. D. in Mechanical Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, USA
• 2008 - 2009: M. Sc. in Mechanical Engineering, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA
• 2003 - 2007: B. Sc. in Control Engineering, "Sapienza" University of Rome, Rome, Italy

Research interests

My research interests are in the general area of medical robotics modeling, design, and control with an emphasis on robots’ interaction with compliant environments. In particular, I am interested in collision detection, estimation of constraint geometry, force feedback and control, telemanipulation of high-degree-of-freedoms non-serial systems, autonomous or semi-guided exploration, image guidance, probabilistic filtering, estimation, and sensor fusion.

Projects

• Snake-like devices for microsurgery of the throat (NOTES)
• Snake-like devices for transurethral resection and surveillance (NOTES)
• NSF Career: Intelligent Flexible Robots for Safe Manipulation of Anatomy
• Image Guided In-Vivo Tooling Platform for Minimal Access Surgery (SPAS)
• COBRA: Cooperative Bio-Inspired Robotic Manipulation Architecture

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Doctoral dissertation

• "Control, Sensing, and Telemanipulation of Surgical Continuum Robots", Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, 2013.

Peer reviewed journal papers

1. Dharamsi, L. M., Bajo, A., Netterville, J. L., Garrett, C. G., Simaan, N., "Evaluation of a Telerobotic System for Transnasal Surgery of the Larynx and Airways in Cadavers", Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery, in press, 2014.
   
2. Goldman, R. E., Bajo, A., and Simaan, N., "Compliant Motion Control for Multi-Segment Continuum Robots with Actuation Force Sensing", IEEE Transaction on Robotics, in press, 2014.
   [DOI: 10.1109/TRO.2014.2309835]
3. Simaan, N., Bajo, A., Long, W., Reiter, A., Allen, P.K., Fowler, D., "Lesson Learned Using the Insertable Robotic Effectors Platform (IREP) for Single Port Access Surgery", Journal of Robotic Surgery, Vol. 7 n. 3, pp. 235-240, 2013. 
   [DOI: 10.1007/s11701-013-0400-9 | Special Issue: Hamlyn Symposium 2012]
4. Goldman, R. E., Bajo, A., MacLachlan, L., Pickens, R., Herrell, S. D., and Simaan, N., "Design and Performance Evaluation of a Minimally Invasive Telerobotic Platform for Transurethral Surveillance and Intervention", IEEE Transaction on Biomedical Engineering, Vol. 60 n.4, pp. 918-925, 2013.
   [DOI: 10.1109/TBME.2012.2226031]
5. Goldman, R. E., Bajo, A., and Simaan, N., "Algorithms for Autonomous Exploration and Estimation in Compliant Environments", Robotica, Vol. 31 n. 1, pp. 71-88, 2013.
   [DOI: 10.1017/S0263574712000100]
6. Bajo, A and Simaan, N., "Kinematic-Based Detection and Localization of Contacts Along Multisegment Continuum Robots", IEEE Transaction on Robotics, Vol. 28 n. 2, pp. 291-302, 2012.
   [DOI: 10.1109/TRO.2011.2175761 | 2012 Impact Factor: 2.571 | Cited by]

Peer reviewed conference papers

1. Bajo, A., Dharamsi, L. M., Netterville, J. L., Garret, C. G., and Simaan, N., "Robotic-Assisted Micro-Surgery of the Throat: the Trans-Nasal Approach", 2013 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Karlsruhe, Germany, pp. 232-238, 2013.
   [Article | Presentation | DOI: 10.1109/ICRA.2013.6630581| finalist best medical robotics paper]
2. Bajo, A., Pickens, R. B., Herrell, S. D., and Simaan, N., "Constrained Motion Control of Multisegment Continuum Robots for Transurethral Bladder Resection and Surveillance", 2013 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Karlsruhe, Germany, pp. 5817-5822, 2013.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1109/ICRA.2013.6631417]
3. Reiter, A., Bajo, A., Iliopoulous, K., Simaan, N., and Allen, P. K., "Learning-Based Configuration Estimation of a Multisegment Continuum Robot", The Fourth IEEE RAS/EMBS International Conference on Biomedical Robotics and Biomechatronics, Roma, Italy, pp. 829-834, 2012.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1109/BioRob.2012.6290702]
4. Tully, S., Bajo, A., Kantor, G., Choset, H., and Simaan, N., "Constrained Filtering with Contact Detection Data for the Localization and Registration of Continuum Robots in Flexible Environments", 2012 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, St. Paul, MN USA, pp 3388-3394, 2012.
   [Article | Presentation | DOI: 10.1109/ICRA.2012.6225080]
5. Bajo, A., Goldman, R. E., Wang, L., Fowler, D. and Simaan, N., "Integration and Preliminary Evaluation of an Insertable Robotic Effectors Platform for Single Port Access Surgery", 2012 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, St. Paul, MN USA, pp 3381-3387, 2012.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1109/ICRA.2012.6224986 | finalist best medical robotics paper | Cited by]
6. Reiter, A., Goldman, R. E., Bajo, A., Iliopoulous, K., Simaan, N., and Allen, P. K., "A Learning Algorithm for Visual Pose Estimation of Continuum Robots", 2011 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems, San Francisco, CA, pp. 2390-2396, 2011.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1109/IROS.2011.6094947]
7. Goldman, R. E., Bajo, A., and Simaan, N., "Compliant Motion Control for Continuum Robots with Intrinsic Actuation Sensing", 2011 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Shanghai, China, pp. 1126-1132, 2011.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1109/ICRA.2011.5980000 | Google Scholar]
8. Bajo, A., Goldman, R. E., and Simaan, N., "Configuration and Joint Feedback for Enhanced Performance of Multi-Segment Continuum Robots", 2011 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Shanghai, China, pp. 2905-2912, 2011.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1109/ICRA.2011.5980005 | Google Scholar]
9. Bajo, A. and Simaan N., "Finding Lost Wrenches: Using Continuum Robots for Contact Detection and Estimation of Contact Location", 2010 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Anchorage, AK, pp. 3666-3673, 2010.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1109/ROBOT.2010.5509569 | Google Scholar]

Short papers, abstracts, and posters

1. Bajo, A., Dharamsi, L. M., Netterville,J . L., Garrett, C. G., Simaan N., "Trans-Nasal Robotic Micro-Surgery of the Throat: A Cadaveric Feasibility Study", 2013 Hamlyn Symposium, London, UK, 2013. [best paper runner up]
2. Tully. S, Bajo, A., Simaan, N., Kantor, G., Choset, H., "A Filtering Approach for Surgical Registration with Unknown Stiffness", 2013 Hamlyn Symposium, London, UK, accepted, 2013.
3. Dharamsi, L. M., Bajo, A., Garret, C. G., Simaan, N., Netterville, J. L., "A Telerobotic System for Transnasal Surgery of the Larynx and Upper Airways", American Academy of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery Foundation 2013 Annual Meeting & OTO EXPO, Vancuver, Canada, Sept 29-Oct 2 2013.
   [Article | DOI: 10.1177/0194599813495815a168]
4. Bajo, A., Pickens, R., Herrell, S.D., Simaan, N., "A Pilot Ex-Vivo Evaluation of a Telerobotic System for Transurethral Intervention and Surveillance", 2012 Hamlyn Symposium, London UK, pp. 33-34, 2012.
5. Simaan, N., Bajo, A., Reiter, A., Allen, P.K., Fowler, D. L., "Lessons Learned Using the Insertable Robotic Effectors Platform (IREP) for Single Port Access Surgery" , 2012 Hamlyn Symposium, London UK, pp. 29-30, 2012. [finalist best paper]
6. Pickens, R., Bajo, A., Simaan, N., Herrell S. D., "Preliminary Testing of a Transurethral Dexterous Robotic System for Bladder Resection", 27th Engineering & Urology Society Annual Meeting, Atlanta, GA, poster #50, session 2A, 2012. [3rd best abstract]
7. Goldman, R. E., Suh, L. K., Bajo, A., Benson, M. C., Simaan, N., "Rapidly Deployable Telerobotic Slave for Transurethral Exploration and Intervention", 26th Engineering & Urology Society Annual Meeting, Washington, DC, 2011.
8. Bajo, A. and Simaan, N., "Contact Detection and Estimation of Contact Location Using Continuum Robots", Columbia Undergraduate Science Journal, New York, NY, 2010.

Patent Applications

1. Simaan, N., Bajo, A., "Systems and methods for robot-assisted transurethral exploration and intervention", PCT/US2013/021167.
2. Simaan, N., Goldman, R. E., Bajo, A., "Dexterous wrists for surgical intervention", PCT/US2013/037336.
3. Simaan, N., Bajo, A., "Robotic device for establishing access channel", PCT/US2013/037353.
4. Simaan, N., Goldman, R. E., Bajo, A., "Method and system for compliant insertion of continuum robots", PCT/US2013/037346.
5. Bajo, A., Simaan, N.,"Method and system for contact detection and contact localization along continuum robots", , US20130300537.

Awards