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SURGEONS may soon be able to operate on a beating heart. Motion compensation software that synchronises the movement of robotic surgical tools with that of the heart will make it possible to operate without stopping or even slowing the heart down. The software, developed by George Mylonas at Imperial College London (ICL), has been designed for use with a type of surgical robot called da Vinci to perform procedures such as arterial bypass surgery.

In traditional bypass surgery the heart is stopped and an artificial pump is used to keep blood flowing around the body. This is highly traumatic as it involves open heart surgery, and means the blood flow is re-routed through a machine. Alternatively, some surgeons now prefer the less drastic approach of slowing the heart down by cooling it. However, even when the heart beats more slowly it is still a moving target, says Rajesh Aggarwal, a surgeon and specialist in minimally invasive procedures at ICL, whose department has been working with Mylonas. "It's a difficult procedure on a stationary piece of tissue, let alone when it is moving," he says. The new system would allow the procedure to be carried out with the chest closed.