Millions of people in the U.S. currently require rehabilitation therapy due to neurologic injury and disease. In the case of stroke alone, there are approximately 600,000 new survivors each year, and over two million survivors with chronic movement deficits. Recent evidence suggests that intensive therapy improves movement recovery. However, such therapy is expensive because it relies on individualized interaction with rehabilitation therapists. The type and quality of therapy also varies greatly between clinics and therapists. Little technology is available to assist patients in practicing therapy on their own. Therapy techniques that require expert feedback or that incorporate manual manipulation of the patient’s limbs are often inaccessible once formal therapy is discontinued.

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A full parallel mechanism is suggested as a base construction for an exoske-leton to implement complex movement of body parts of the human relativ to each other. The optimal design of such a structure for a thigh is presented. The positions of the connection points of the linear actuators to the moving platform were chosen as design parameters. The calculation of these design parameters was perform numericaly. The results show that the designed parallel mechanism allows arbitrary motion of the thigh in a workspace of the mechanism which is large enough not only for walking but also for more complex movements like sitting down on a chair and standing up.

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A novel control methodology for master-slave systems using passive force feedback has been proposed by the authors. The methodology solves the conventional problems of previously developed master-slave systems with force feedback, such as oscillations, complex structures and complicated control algorithm. In the present paper a multi-fingered exoskeleton haptic device (master hand) with passive force feedback function is developed. First, the exoskeleton master hand with three fingers (12 degrees of freedom) is designed and implemented. Each finger of the master hand consists of a link mechanism with elastic-shaft joints and clutches. Using link mechanisms, the master hand measures fingertip positions and angles of index finger middle finger and thumb. Furthermore, it also enables passive force feedback to an operator by the same link mechanism used for the geometric measurements. Then, a virtual reality system of human hand is constructed using the master hand and the control methodology. Using the system, sensory evaluations are conducted on human subjects to confirm the usability of the developed master hand and the possibility of the control methodology in the virtual reality system. As a result, the subjects possibly recognize the stiffness of the objects in the virtual environment.

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