MANY MINDEDA teleoperated humanoid removed a pig's gallbladder in a lab first
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego demonstrated a humanoid robot, nicknamed Surgie, performing live surgery on anesthetized pigs — removing the gallbladder in two successful operations. The robot was not autonomous; an expert surgeon teleoperated it through a stereoscopic headset that gave a magnified 3D view, using an input device to control the movements. Study authors included Michael Yip and Nikita Thareja. Human surgeons stayed on standby and intervened only minimally.
What makes the work notable is the hardware. The team used a commercially available Unitree G1 — a general-purpose humanoid just over four feet tall and weighing about 77 pounds — rather than a machine built for surgery. They customized its hands to switch between surgical tools quickly. In one procedure, a second humanoid briefly held the camera. One operation involved minor bleeding and bile leakage, both described as easily managed.
Why it could matter for health and care: purpose-built surgical robots are expensive and specialized. Showing that an off-the-shelf humanoid can be adapted to assist in surgery under a surgeon's control hints at a cheaper, more flexible path toward extending skilled surgical capacity to places that lack it.
The caveats are heavy. This was pigs, not people, and only two operations. The system is early-stage: it overheated and needed cooling breaks, its limited reach forced repeated repositioning and recalibration that added minutes each time, and surgeons noted those interruptions could raise risk in a real operating room. Watch whether the reliability improves before any move toward human trials.
Source: Singularity Hub