# VINE Catheter: Soft, Tip-extending, Robotic Catheters with Shape Control for Endovascular Surgery

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO · 2022 · $457,423

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY
Endovascular surgeries (ES) increasingly augment or replace traditional open surgical treatment of brain, liver,
heart, and vascular diseases due to their improved clinical outcomes, faster recovery times, and improved mor-
tality rates. These surgeries are commonly performed by inserting endovascular equipment into the groin or arm
and navigating to distal arteries through a combination of axial loading and rotation of the base of the tools,
utilizing the curved tips to deflect into intended locations and vessels. Despite the many benefits of endovascular
surgeries, vascular anatomy, particularly for elderly patients who represent a large portion of those undergoing
such procedures, can demonstrate excessive tortuosity and severe angulation, leading to high-risk , time-intensive
procedures that can only be performed by a select number of expertly trained specialists. The small number
of specialists results in limited access to necessary treatment, and patients are forced to either wait and travel
for treatment or to not receive treatment at all. There is therefore a critical need for new endovascular robotic
surgical tools that are safe, e↵ective, and that enable more surgeons to successfully navigate challenging anatomies.
To address this need, a new soft-robotic approach called VINE – Vascular Internal Navigation by
Extension – will be used. When pressurized with fluid, these VINEs navigate via extension at their tip in a man-
ner analogous to how plants grow, creating shapes with complex curvatures. These VINEs are inherently safer
due to their soft structure and represent a fundamentally di↵erent method of movement. The overall objective of
this work is to characterize the behavior and refine the design of the VINE for ES, including the shape control
methods, and to validate its e"cacy and safety. The central hypothesis is that this new method of shape control
and navigation via tip-extension enables VINEs to safely and e↵ectively traverse the vasculature. The central
hypothesis will be tested by pursuing three specific aims: (1) characterize and refine small-scale, pre-shaped and
steerable VINE designs for ES, (2) evaluate VINE e"cacy in bench-top models, and (3) validate the safety of the
entire VINE system in an in vivo pig study. This work will serve as a first step towards achieving the long-term
goal of creating a soft robotic catheterization system, operable by a large number of surgeons, to increase access
to high-quality surgical treatment.
This work is innovative in that the proposed VINE is the first everting, robotic catheter with shape control and
represents a substantive departure from the status quo, which currently relies on pushing semi-rigid instruments
from their proximal end. The expected contribution of this work is a preliminary soft, tip-extending robotic system
capable of safely and e↵ectively navigating around acute turns and through winding paths of the vasculature, which
is significant since it will ultimate...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10522892
- **Project number:** 1R01EB032417-01A1
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO
- **Principal Investigator:** Tania Kiyoye Morimoto
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $457,423
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2022-09-30 → 2026-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10522892

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10522892, VINE Catheter: Soft, Tip-extending, Robotic Catheters with Shape Control for Endovascular Surgery (1R01EB032417-01A1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10522892. Licensed CC0.

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