Peter prepared his thesis in collaboration with the Austrian Center for Medical Innovation and Technology, ACMIT GmbH. Throughout the process, he consulted primarily with his thesis advisor, Wolfgang Ptacek. All formal requirements are met at an excellent level, and the final presentation of both the theoretical foundation and the results is exemplary. The preliminary results are interesting and will be further tested in preclinical experiments. The presented work is of a high standard; I recommend a grade of Excellent (A – 100 points).

Evaluation from the consultant of the thesis - Dipl.-Ing. Wolfgang Ptacek:
Mr. Koppensteiner did a fantastic job implementing our robotic platform to be compatible with the Leksell Vantage stereotactic system, enabling a smooth integration into the current clinical workflow, based on a thorough state-of-the-art examination of medical robotics in the neurosurgical sector. Starting with the collection of user needs and system requirements he derived suitable design specifications that led to a prototype design which he build-up in a working mock-up, using 3D printing technologies. Derived from a real MR dataset he created a phantom head providing the possibility to evaluate system accuracy in all clinically relevant DBS targets. Using this phantom a pre-clinical study was conducted at the Medical University Hospital in Graz to evaluate the robotic setup in comparison to the manual setup by means of achievable accuracy and time needed to align to the planned trajectories. Mr. Koppensteiner carried out the tasks assigned to him with great dedication, extreme care, and a consistent focus on finding optimal solutions, as reflected in the successful outcome of the pre-clinical trial. Points proposed by supervisor: 100

Regarding presentation quality the work gives a well balanced overview from the clinical use case, to existing treatment options (i.e. state of the art), to finally the new development in question. What could have been a bit more elaborated are the specific requirements for the system, but this is a minor issue. Also the chapter "Materials and Methods" is a bit short - but only because most of the description has been included in chapter "Results". But this might be more of a question of taste and does not really limit the high quality of the work.
Both formatting of the technical report and language quality is excellent - use of references is fully sufficient.
The main result of the work, i.e. the design of a robot adapter for DBS procedures is excellent, meticulously thought out in every detail. First test results and the feedback from the clinicians were very promising. All together, the setup shows high potential for a successful clinical application and - together with Mr. Koppensteiner - we already trying to bring the system to the next level (i.e. to a first cadaver trial).
Based on the aforementioned assessment, my overall grading of the work are 96 points. Points proposed by reviewer: 96