Team SERA, a new collaboration between the Active and Interactive Robotics (AIR) Lab and the Orthopaedic Mechatronics (ORTHOtron) Lab, led by master's students Jeffrey Lee and Teresa Marotta, Dr. Stewart McLachlin, and Dr. Yue Hu from the department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering has been established to combine the expertise of both labs for a new surgical robotics project for the international KUKA Innovation Award 2025 - Medical Robotics Challenge 2.0.
This is the second year in a row that a team from the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering was selected as a finalist for this international competition and is once again the only North American team selected, representing both the University of Waterloo and Canada to a global audience! Team SERA, which stands for Surgical Environment Collaborative Assistant, was developed with the idea of creating a robust collaborative multitasking robotic assistant for orthopedic surgery. The basis of this approach is the creation of modularized workflows where different types of tasks and tools can be adapted to the needs of a surgical procedure.
Recently, the team was invited to exhibit their work at the 2025 IEEE-RAS International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) in Atlanta, GA, USA, the largest robotics conference in the world, with over 7,000 participants and 140 exhibitors. Their work attracted large crowds of academics and industry leaders, showing off the University of Waterloo's research to a global audience. Later this year, the team will head to Germany in November for their final showcase for the KUKA Innovation Award at the MEDICA trade fair, where they will compete for the €20,000 grand prize (close to $32,000 CAD).
Underscoring the growing interest in surgical robotics in the faculty, this project has provided new hands-on experience for many. This team comprises of undergraduate students: Evie Bouganim, Noam Borenstein, Keith Davidson, Kaveet Grewal, Ben Boguslavsky, and fourth-year Capstone Design team, OrthoBore, made up of students Salahuddin Said, Keith Davidson, Botond Ivan, Souvik Sil, and Bara Husseini, winners of the John Medley Biomedical Award at the 2025 Mechanical Engineering Capstone Symposium, and master's students: Sarah Hynes, Marie De May, Finn Breuer, and Volodymyr Beimuk. Together, the team aims to tackle tasks in ACL reconstruction surgery, provide precision, and alleviate workload through automation.
Keep up to date with Team SERA's journey by following the Active and Interactive Robotics Lab and the Orthopaedic Mechatronics Lab on LinkedIn!