Imagine a world where orthotics are not simple passive supports for physically challenged people, but rather highly cooperative, smart devices. They are lightweight and simple to don and doff, respond to the user’s intent and enable normal healthy limb like use. They can help users relearn natural movement pathways following stroke and injury, or provide exercise tailored to the user’s specific disabilities. A new generation of soft and active orthotics is proposed for a broad range of applications in physical therapy and rehabilitation. As part of the AIP SPS funded project, we began development of such orthopedic braces through physics based biomechanical simulation, human subject experiments, data analysis and experimentation with a biologically-inspired shoulder-arm model and a preliminary sensor network. A joint work with collaborators at the Harvard University shows that the proposed braces can be successfully actuated with biologically-realistic forces [1]. Furthermore, our recent results demonstrate that arm angular position can be accurately estimated with inexpensive, piezoelectric flex sensors embedded in the brace.

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