Purpose. To develop a robotic gait trainer that can be used in water (RGTW) and achieve repetitive physiological gait patterns to improve the movement dysfunctions. Method. The RGTW is a hip-knee-ankle-foot orthosis with pneumatic actuators; the control software was developed on the basis of the angular motions of the hip and knee joint of a healthy subject as he walked in water. Three-dimensional motions and electromyographic (EMG) activities were recorded in nine healthy subjects to evaluate the efficacy of using the RGTW while walking on a treadmill in water. Results. The device could preserve the angular displacement patterns of the hip and knee and foot trajectories under all experimental conditions. The tibialis anterior EMG activities in the late swing phase and the biceps femoris throughout the stance phase were reduced whose joint torques were assisted by the RGTW while walking on a treadmill in water. Conclusion. Using the RGTW could expect not only the effect of the hydrotherapy but also the standard treadmill gait training, in particular, and may be particularly effective for treating individuals with hip joint movement dysfunction.

(далее…)

Категория: Научные статьи | Нет комментариев »

Цибин Пэй (Qibing Pei) и его коллеги из Калифорнийского университета в Лос-Анджелесе (UCLA) и ряда других научных центров и компаний США построили синтетические мускулы, способные практически без потери силы переносить небольшие повреждения.

(далее…)

Категория: Двигатели | 1 Комментарий »

Degenerative neuromuscular diseases as muscular dystrophy may severely reduce the autonomous mobility of the subject’s limbs. Most subjects can recover some autonomy by means of external devices mounted on their wheelchairs. The helping devices can be active — generally motor driven- or passive. Sometime the active devices require a driving action of the contralateral upper limb. Following a specific request of some people, as first step of the research a simple and passive helping device has been designed, built and tested on subjects affected by muscular dystrophy (MD). The preliminary tests demonstrate that the prototype can increase the subjects’ upper limbs range of motion and that it is well accepted by the dystrophic patients.

(далее…)

Категория: Научные статьи | Нет комментариев »

In this paper, a new biomimetic tendon-driven actuation system for prosthetic and wearable robotic hand applications is presented. It is based on the combination of compliant tendon cables and one-way shape memory alloy (SMA) wires that form a set of agonist–antagonist artificial muscle pairs for the required flexion/extension or abduction/adduction of the finger joints. The performance of the proposed actuation system is demonstrated using a 4 degree-of-freedom (three active and one passive) artificial finger testbed, also developed based on a biomimetic design approach. A microcontroller-based pulse-width-modulated proportionalderivation (PWM-PD) feedback controller and a minimum jerk trajectory feedforward controller are implemented and tested in an ad hoc fashion to evaluate the performance of the finger system in emulating natural joint motions. Part II describes the dynamic modeling of the above nonlinear system, and the model-based controller design.

(далее…)

Категория: Научные статьи | Нет комментариев »

The exoskeleton-type system is a brand new type of man–machine intelligent system. It fully combines human intelligence and machine power so that machine in-telligence and human operator’s power are both enhanced. Therefore, it achieves a high-level performance that neither could separately. This paper describes the basic exoskeleton concepts from biological system to man–machine intelligent systems. It is followed by an overview of the development history of exoske-leton-type systems and their two main applications in teleoperation and human power augmentation. Besides the key technologies in exoskeleton-type systems, the research is presented from several viewpoints of the biomechanical design, system structure modelling, cooperation and function allocation, control strategy, and safety evaluation.

(далее…)

Категория: Научные статьи | Нет комментариев »