Plates and screws that hold skull bone rigid during neurosurgery, with a screwdriver interface that grips hard and then lets go cleanly on command.
A cranial screw has to sit on the driver blade tightly enough that a surgeon can place it one-handed, deep in a wound, without it dropping. Then it has to release the instant it is seated, without pulling the plate or the bone with it. Those two requirements fight each other, and both live in a press-fit a couple of millimetres across. Add a driver bit that dulls slightly with every insertion, and grip that felt right on the first screw of an operation can be wrong by the twentieth.
Mechanical design of the plate geometries and the screw-to-blade press-fit interface, plus a custom detachment mechanism for controlled release.
A robotic arm rig that performs 100 standardised insertions at constant torque, so grip and release behaviour is measured across a run instead of judged by hand.
Wear analysis on the driver bits from that data, feeding back into geometry and material choices.
3D-printed prototypes and FEA, with the design optimised for manufacture.
A fixation system whose engagement and release stay consistent across a full run of insertions, with durability and bit wear quantified on a robotic rig rather than inferred. The kind of evidence a surgeon never sees and depends on entirely.
