While most mobility options for persons with paraple-gia or paraparesis employ wheeled solutions, significant adverse health, psychological, and social consequ-ences result from wheelchair confinement.Modern robotic exoskeleton devices for gait assistance and rehabilitation, however, can support legged locomotion systems for those with lower extremity weakness or paralysis. The Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) has developed the Mina, a proto-type sensorimotor robotic orthosis for mobility assistance that provides mobility capability for paraplegic and paraparetic users. This paper describes the initial concept, design goals, and methods of this wearable overground robotic mobility device, which uses compliant actuation to power the hip and knee joints. Paralyzed users can balance and walk using the device over level terrain with the assistance of forearm crutches employing a quadrupedal gait. We have initiated sensory substitution feedback mechanisms to augment user sensory perception of his or her lower extremities. Using this sensory feedback, we hypo-thesize that users will ambulate with a more natural, upright gait and will be able to directly control the gait parameters and respond to perturbations. This may allow bipedal (with minimal support) gait in fu-ture prototypes.

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For centuries, man has been building machines to serve his needs. With his ability to imagine and his creativity, he was able to nurture his thoughts and give rise to machines that would work for him incessantly and do his bidding. This enabled Man to exert his superiority over other species that roamed the earth. Over the centuries man’s needs have grown increasingly complex and as a consequence so has the level of sophistication of his Machines. The advanced functional capabilities of the human brain enabled man to mimic the features of the other species. One such adaptation is the Amour, an artificial Exoskeleton that Man has used for protection, especially in combat. An Exoskeleton is an external skeleton that supports and protects an animal’s body, for example the Tortoise, in contrast to the internal endoskeleton of, for example, a human. The concept of the Artificial Exoskeleton further evolved through the ages.

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A portable load lifting assist system (100) includes a movable support structure including an exoskeleton torso (160) including an exoskeleton trunk (109) that is configured to be coupled to a person’s upper body, and a load lifting mechanism (221) secured to the movable support structure including a winch (229) having a motor driven reel mechanism for reeling first and second lifting straps or cables (222) that are secured to first and second end effectors (223). First and second handles (224) are attached to an outside surface of the first and second end effectors, wherein the lifting straps or cables when driven by the winch lift a load contacted by the first and second end effectors. A lower extremity exoskeleton (120) is configured to be coupled to a person’s lower limbs. The exoskeleton trunk couples to the person’s upper body through an upper body interface device (150(a)) that is coupled to the lower extremity exoskeleton.

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John Register’s Olympic dreams were crushed while he was training for Atlanta in 1994. An improper landing from a hurdle jump hyper extended his knee, severing a leg artery and ultimately leading to an amputation. Register was faced with a choice between confinement to a wheelchair or a prosthesis followed by intense therapy and rehabilitation. The desire to be independent and mobile led him to opt for the latter. Register was fitted with an above-knee prosthetic leg. The limb consisted of soft, flexible plastic and carbon graphite with openings to allow the thigh muscles to grow. This was revolutionary compared to ordinary prosthetics, with their hard, rigid sockets. Non-pliable materials confine the muscles, causing them to atrophy. Prosthetic composition was a necessary consideration for John Register; compliant substances absorb the impact of heel strike, and the muscles can generate the necessary energy to move the knee and proceed through the stride. If the material is too compliant, there is not enough reaction force to propel the leg forward into swing phase. In this situation, the knee and hip must generate a large amount of force to continue the motion, costing the amputee a great amount of extra energy and work.

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Brain–machine interfaces use neuronal activity recorded from the brain to establish direct communication with external actuators, such as prosthetic arms. It is hoped that brain–machine interfaces can be used to restore the normal sensorimotor functions of the limbs, but so far they have lacked tactile sensation. Here we report the operation of a brain–machine–brain interface (BMBI) that both controls the exploratory reaching movements of an actuator and allows signalling of artificial tactile feedback through intracortical microstimulation (ICMS) of the primary somatosensory cortex. Monkeys performed an active exploration task in which an actuator (a computer cursor or a virtual-reality arm) was moved using a BMBI that derived motor commands from neuronal ensemble activity recorded in the primary motor cortex. ICMS feedback occurred whenever the actuator touched virtual objects. Temporal patterns of ICMS encoded the artificial tactile properties of each object. Neuronal recordings and ICMS epochs were temporally multiplexed to avoid interference. Two monkeys operated this BMBI to search for and distinguish one of three visually identical objects, using the virtual-reality arm to identify the unique artificial texture associated with each. These results suggest that clinical motor neuroprostheses might benefit from the addition of ICMS feedback to generate artificial somatic perceptions associated with mechanical, robotic or even virtual prostheses.

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