Development of a Novel Redundant Parallel Mechanism with Enlarged Workspace and Enhanced Dexterity for Fracture Reduction Surgery

The limited workspace and complex singularity issues are predominant factors impeding the clinical applicability of fracture reduction parallel robots. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a novel redundant parallel mechanism (NRPM) for robotic-assisted fracture reduction with an enlarged workspace and enhanced dexterity capabilities based on the traditional Stewart parallel mechanism (SPM). With six redundant degrees-of-freedom (DOFs) added to the novel mechanism, the kinematics of NRPM needs to be thoroughly analyzed. Furthermore, the calculation of its workspace and determination of its dexterity are deduced. Both the analytical simulation and real experiment results demonstrated the effectiveness and superior performance of the proposed NRPM compared to SPM.