• origami
• capsule
• endoscopy

The use of capsule endoscopy procedure comes from a huge clinical need for the diagnosis of gastrointestinal bleeding, especially the one that involves small bowel and upper intestine, that are difficult to examine. The mortality for intestinal bleeding remains constant, even though progress in therapy have been made during the half past century. Therefore, the Origami capsule proposed in this thesis, has born to enhance the diagnostic treatment of small bowel bleeding, becoming a perfect auxiliar support for the commercial video capsule’s examination. Origami-opening prototype has been developed through mechanical and mathematical analysis in order to ensure that the capsule stops into the small bowel’s tract, as the name STOPPY highlights; this will let the other capsule have good video acquisition during endoscopy. The mechanism consists in the use of Origami folding pattern, inspired by NASA StarShade structure, embedded in the 33.3 mm in length and 11 mm diameter capsule’s case. When the capsule bleeding’s sensor activates, the Origami structure opens and anchors to the small bowel’s wall trough magnetic activation. Mathematical magnetic modelling and experimental forces have been estimated: according to peristaltic forces developed from small bowel’s wall, STOPPY is well tolerated from upper intestine, without having damaging or breaking of it.