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FROM its humble beginnings at hawker centres to being listed in CNN's 50 most delicious foods list, the chilli crab's journey has been an interesting one. It has now inspired a team of researchers in Singapore to create a miniature robot with pincers and hooks that can remove early-stage stomach cancers without leaving a scar. And three Indian patients became the first to be treated using the robot at a hospital in Hyderabad in July last year.

The researchers claim that the procedure takes less than 20 minutes and allows patients to go home the same day, thereby reducing costs substantially.

Developed by associate professor Louis Phee of Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and Professor Lawrence Ho of National University Hospital (NUH) after six years of research, the robot will be commercially available only in three years. However, its trials and tests are underway.

Dr Ho and Prof Phee were inspired by Hong Kong surgeon Sydney Chung to develop the robot after a chilli crab dinner in Singapore in 2004.

In the device, the pincer and the hook are attached to an endoscope which enters the stomach through the mouth. With the help of a tiny camera on the endoscope, a surgeon can see inside the stomach.

The robotic arms, which are 6mm in diameter, are controlled using a video game-like joystick. The pincer is then used to hold up the cancerous tissue while the hook slices it off.

The arms have the capability to feel the softness of the delicate stomach tissues and intestines, so doctors at the console can vary the pressure accordingly.

Last July, three Indian middle-aged men were treated with the help of this crab-like robot, called MASTER (Master And Slave Transluminal Endoscopic Robot). The operations, which were broadcast live, were performed by Dr Duvvuru Nageshwar Reddy and his team at the Asian Institute of Gastroenterology (AIG) in Hyderabad. All three procedures were successful and two of the patients left the hospital the same day while one was kept on observation overnight as he experienced slight bleeding.

Prof Phee, who is the chairman of IEEE Robotics and Automation Chapter, Singapore, told tabla! that AIG, which is one of Asia's largest outpatient centres doing therapeutic endoscopy, was chosen for the surgery as it was the first to get required approval for human trials and also because the patients were readily available.

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