• analisi elementi finiti
• endoscopia
• leghe a memoria di forma

Endoluminal devices for minimally invasive surgical and/or diagnostic applications have recently begun to show great promise for improving treatment of various diseases, particularly in the gastrointestinal tract. The thesis is involved in the development of miniaturized and swallowable capsules, able to move inside the human body performing diagnosis and surgical operations, enabling early diagnosis, minimization of patients discomfort and health-care costs reduction.
Bio-inspired legs would enable endoscopic capsule locomotion and represent the interface with the colon: this study aim to optimize the legs design. The activity includes the characterization of the superelastic material in order to extract its behaviour and its fatigue resistance. Nitinol is well accepted and highly exploited in the medical field, therefore, studying the mechanical properties of this material is important in order to get quantitative data for a reliable design of novel components. A Finite Element Modelling analysis on the leg is carried on in order to predict the stress-strain internal state and the life-time. Theoretical results are compared with experimental data to optimize the design.