Spatial Context Awareness in Surgery through Sound Source Localization
Abstract
Context awareness and scene understanding is an integral component for the development of intelligent systems in computer-aided and robotic surgery. While most systems primarily utilize visual data for scene understanding, recent proof-of-concepts have showcased the potential of acoustic signals for the detection and analysis of surgical activity that is associated with typical noise emissions. However, acoustic approaches have not yet been effectively employed for localization tasks in surgery, which are crucial to obtain a comprehensive understanding of a scene. In this work, we introduce the novel concept of Sound Source Localization (SSL) for surgery which can reveal acoustic activity and its location in the surgical field, therefore providing insight into the interactions of surgical staff with the patient and medical equipment.