Novel soft bending actuator based power augmentation hand exoskeleton controlled by human intention

This article presents the development of a soft material power augmentation wearable robot using novel bending soft artificial muscles. This soft exoskeleton was developed as a human hand power augmentation system for healthy or partially hand disabled individuals. The proposed prototype serves healthy manual workers by decreasing the muscular effort needed for grasping objects. Furthermore, it is a power augmentation wearable robot for partially hand disabled or post-stroke patients, supporting and augmenting the fingers’ grasping force with minimum muscular effort in most everyday activities. This wearable robot can fit any adult hand size without the need for any mechanical system changes or calibration. Novel bending soft actuators are developed to actuate this power augmentation device. The performance of these actuators has been experimentally assessed. A geometrical kinematic analysis and mathematical output force model have been developed for the novel actuators. The performance of this mathematical model has been proven experimentally with promising results. The control system of this exoskeleton is created by hybridization between cascaded position and force closed loop intelligent controllers. The cascaded position controller is designed for the bending actuators to follow the fingers in their bending movements. The force controller is developed to control the grasping force augmentation. The operation of the control system with the exoskeleton has been experimentally validated. EMG signals were monitored during the experiments to determine that the proposed exoskeleton system decreased the muscular efforts of the wearer

Upper limb rehabilitation using robotic exoskeleton systems: a systematic review

Exoskeleton assisted therapy has been reported as a significant reduction in impairment and gain in functional abilities of stroke patients. In this paper, we conduct a systematic review on the upper limb rehabilitation using robotic exoskeleton systems. This review is based on typical mechanical structures and control strategies for exoskeletons in clinical rehabilitation conditions. A variety of upper limb exoskeletons are classified and reviewed according to their rehabilitation joints. Special attentions are paid to the performance control strategies and mechanism designs in clinical trials and to promote the adaptability to different patients and conditions. Finally, we analyze and highlight the current research gaps and the future directions in this field. We intend to offer informative resources and reliable guidance for relevant researcher’s further studies, and exert a far-reaching influence on the development of advanced upper limb exoskeleton robotic systems

A review : a comprehensive review of soft and rigid wearable rehabilitation and assistive devices with a focus on the shoulder joint

The importance of the human upper limb role in performing daily life and personal activities is significant. Improper functioning of this organ due to neurological disorders or surgeries can greatly affect the daily activities performed by patients. This paper aims to comprehensively review soft and rigid wearable robotic devices provided for rehabilitation and assistance focusing on the shoulder joint. In the last two decades, many devices have been proposed in this regard, however, there have been a few groups whose devices have had effective therapeutic capability with acceptable clinical evidence. Also, there were not many portable, lightweight and user-friendly devices. Therefore, this comprehensive study could pave the way for achieving optimal future devices, given the growing need for these devices. According to the results, the most commonly used plan was Exoskeleton, the most commonly used actuators were electrical, and most devices were considered to be stationary and rigid. By doing these studies, the advantages and disadvantages of each method are also presented. The presented devices each have a new idea and attitude in a specific field to solve the problems of movement disorders and rehabilitation, which were in the form of prototypes, initial clinical studies and sometimes comprehensive clinical and commercial studies. These plans need more comprehensive clinical trials to become a complete and efficient plan. This article could be used by researchers to identify and evaluate the important features and strengths and weaknesses of the plans to lead to the presentation of more optimal plans in the future

6-REXOS: Upper limb exoskeleton robot with Improved pHRI

Close interaction can be observed between an exoskeleton robot and its wearer. Therefore, appropriate physical human-robot interaction (pHRI) should be considered when designing an exoskeleton robot to provide safe and comfortable motion assistance. Different features have been used in recent studies to enhance the pHRI in upperlimb exoskeleton robots. However, less attention has been given to integrating kinematic redundancy into upper-limb exoskeleton robots to improve the pHRI. In this context, this paper proposes a six-degrees-of-freedom (DoF) upperlimb exoskeleton robot (6-REXOS) for the motion assistance of physically weak individuals. The 6-REXOS uses a kinematically different structure to that of the human lower arm, where the exoskeleton robot is worn. The 6-REXOS has four active DoFs to generate the motion of the human lower arm. Furthermore, two flexible bellow couplings are attached to the wrist and elbow joints to generate two passive DoFs. These couplings not only allow translational motion in wrist and elbow joints but also a redundancy in the robot. Furthermore, the compliance of the flexible coupling contributes to avoiding misalignments between human and robot joint axes. The redundancy in the 6- REXOS is verified based on manipulability index, minimum singular value, condition number and manipulability ellipsoids. The 6-REXOS and a four-DoF exoskeleton robot are compared to verify the manipulation advantage due to the redundancy. The four-DoF exoskeleton robot is designed by excluding the two passive DoFs of the 6- REXOS. In addition, a kinematic model is proposed for the human lower arm to validate the performance of the 6- REXOS. Kinematic analysis and simulations are carried out to validate the 6-REXOS and human-lower-arm model

Have difficulty standing up? soft exosuitsare here to help!

Soft robotics is a novel disruptive technology that is revolutionizing the fields of robotics. Innovative use of compliant materials by researchers has elevated soft robotics over contemporary technologies. The Computational Sensing and Smart Machines (CSSM) laboratory of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Moratuwa, has been taking strides in the development of soft robotics, ranging from actuators, sensors, and applications