Today, many men must choose between a life-changing prostatectomy and careful long-term monitoring. The EU-funded ROBIOSPY project offers an intermediate option of precise needle-based diagnosis and targeted therapy with AI-driven robots.
This initiative focuses on successful projects funded by the European Innovation Council (EIC). Featured on DeepSync, part of the EIC Community Project, these stories offer a unique opportunity to connect with fellow members and innovators. By showcasing the challenges and successes along each project’s journey, these stories highlight key moments and insights, increasing visibility, fostering deeper understanding, and fostering collective knowledge exchange across the community.
He spent 15 years at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory building robots for space missions, giving him a special perspective on the world. Machines are built to be stable, tireless, and do exactly what they are told. But it’s humans who decide what’s important, adapt when the unexpected happens, and give those machines purpose. Technology is most effective not because it compensates for human imperfections, but because it is shaped by human insight, care, responsibility, and experience.
So when veteran robotics researcher Professor Paolo Fiorini returned to Italy in 2001 and founded the ALTAIR Laboratory for Medical Robotics at the University of Verona, he re-entered an academic world full of valuable publications, but with little real-world therapeutic application. ”In the early 2000s, there were no surgical robots, everything was avant-garde and experimental.” he recalls.Companies do their own research, but their technology is only published in journals. Your research had no real-world impact. ”
That frustration sowed the seeds that, through the EU-funded Robiopsy project, eventually grew into the deep-tech spin-off company Needle Robotics, which developed an autonomous system to transform the diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer.
Prostate cancer is a slow-burning disease. It is the second most commonly diagnosed cancer in men worldwide after lung cancer, and ranks first in incidence in many countries, including EU member states, where more than 335,000 new cases are reported each year.
It is often said that men die, and not that from It complicates the cognitive and therapeutic horizons. Unlike other cancers that are easy to detect and have high recovery rates, many prostate tumors go undetected for years and are sometimes only discovered after they have spread. Prostate cancer is the fifth leading cause of cancer death worldwide (after lung, liver, colorectal, and stomach) and is the third leading cause of cancer death among men in Europe.
Approximately 3 million prostate biopsies are performed each year in Europe and the United States, but the process is far from accurate. The manual collection of prostate tissue and the limitations of the imperfect biomarker prostate-specific antigen (PSA) make testing extremely difficult. As a result, diagnostic errors can exceed 25%.
This challenge is partially mechanical. The biopsy needle must be passed by hand through the soft tissue to hit the walnut-sized target, which is barely visible on an MRI scan. This procedure is delicate and requires skill and experience. Small tumors are easily missed, so patients can go home with peace of mind, unaware that a malignant tumor may still be present.
For many years, the only reliable treatment was complete removal of the prostate. It works, but it comes at a cost. Between 5 and 20 percent of men who experience this condition experience long-term incontinence or sexual dysfunction. As a result, many men choose active surveillance instead, being monitored with annual scans, blood tests, and occasional repeat biopsies.
The BMJ study found that although incidence rates differ by up to 20 times between EU countries, mortality rates vary by only about five times, pointing to overdiagnosis and overtreatment. Men facing prostate cancer often have to choose between two extremes: life-changing surgery or waiting anxiously. ”You have these two opposite qualities. there’s nothing in between” explains Paolo.This is an area where the natural limitations of human judgment can lead to inconsistencies, and where robotics and artificial intelligence can bring about real change.. ”
Where academic research meets financial reality
This is where the robot comes back into the story. Paolo’s idea was simple: automate prostate biopsies so that the needle hits exactly where the scan tells it to. The team built a prototype and validated the concept with support from the European Research Council’s Proof of Concept PROST initiative. ”When we created the first prototype and released it to the public, doctors responded enthusiastically, saying, “Yes, let’s try this. This sounds interesting.”” Paolo recalls.
But soon economic realities intervened. Although the concept was promising, it was not financially sustainable for the hospital. This setback taught Paolo a valuable lesson. ”From a project perspective, you won’t necessarily be able to realize your initial idea, but you will be able to make a real impact.He didn’t lose faith in the project, he just gained a clearer understanding of what the technology could accomplish within real-world constraints.
The turning point was a European Innovation Council (EIC) transition grant that transformed the project from simple diagnosis to a specific treatment approach called focal therapy. Rather than removing the entire prostate, only the tumor itself is burned or frozen using a precisely placed needle. It is less curative, quality of life is better preserved, and patients can remain under surveillance.
Attacking small areas inside the body requires exquisite precision, and Paolo’s robotics can place the needle or probe in the exact same location every time. ”The greatest advantage is that this contribution of robotic support can be brought to intermediate therapy” says Paolo.
As it stands in 2026, Paolo’s research team is now aiming to carry out calibration tests in the laboratory before final testing on cadavers. This is the final safety step before the technology is fully fine-tuned for clinical trials in patients. He recognizes that this is not the only solution to the challenge at hand: testing versus treating prostate cancer, because the potential benefits are so great.
Investors don’t always fully understand deep-tech medical robotics, and AI and robotics talent is scarce and costly. ”Time dilation is no problem if you have a researcher hat on. Putting on your entrepreneur hat, delays due to economic reasons can seriously impact your company” says Paolo.
Paolo, now retired, jokes that the title of his talk to young engineers should be “From research to product – or how to ruin a nice pension.”. ”I still want to contribute” he says.Robotics has a lot to offer healthcare. we have to find the right path to make it happen. ”
