The light weight robots used for robotized tele-echography allow the medical expert to remotely operate a 2D-ultrasound probe. The real-time analysis of the patient's ultrasound images, received via a standard communication link, provides the expert with relevant information to define a diagnosis. The clinical validations of the robotized tele-echography concept show that it is possible to overcome the lack of sonographers in medically isolated sites. The robot probe-holder is usually positioned and held on the patient's body by a paramedical staff based on information provided by the specialist via videoconferencing. However, the small mass of the robot, the fact that it is held by an assistant on the patient's body and the patient's physiological movements cause disturbances in the position of the probe ; this thus can generate a loss of the region of interest of the organ being under investigation during the teleoperated medical act. This thesis work focuses on the development of a visual servoing approach based on 2D ultrasound image moments. 2D moments calculation is based on the contour points of the image section of interest, therefore an image-processing algorithm is needed to effectively detect and follow the contour of interest in motion. For this reason, a parametric active contour method based on Fourier descriptors is presented. The control laws, corresponding to three independent autonomous tasks to search and maintain the visibility of an organ within a given ultrasound plane during the tele-operated medical act are implemented and validated on robotic platform project ANR Prosit.
