"So it's sort of a long pill shaped device, if you will,” he said. It has a camera and lighting to help with navigation.
Think of it like a small lunar rover to explore the often-unpredictable landscape inside your intestine and perhaps one day perform colonoscopies with guidance from a doctor.
The idea is to free up doctors’ time, "so that the physician really can sit back and focus on diagnosis and treatment, instead of that arduous task of getting the colonoscope all the way through the colon," Rentschler said.
Rentschler says they're still testing the robot but hope to have it in use in five years.
Editor's Note: A previous version of this story incorrectly spells Mark Rentschler's name and states which CU campus the endoculus team work from.