Design Of An Anthropomorphic Upper Limb Exoskeleton Actuated By Ball-Screws And Cables

International audienceThis paper presents the design of ABLE, an anthropomorphic upper limb exoskeleton integrally actuated by highly reversible ball-screw and cable (SCS standing for Screw-and-Cable-System) allowing true joint torque control without force sensor. Their unique kinematics allows their integration in the structure thanks to dedicated mechanical innovations such as the shoulder articulation and the forearm-wrist. The result is an anthropomorphic, lightweight, open architecture which avoids imprisoning the human limb. Applicative projects are briefly presented in: medical rehabilitation, teleoperation and haptics (VR).Lucrarea prezintă proiectul lui ABLE, un exoschelet al braţului, integralacţionat de un sistem şurub cu cap sferic şi cablu (SSC, de la sistem cu şurub şicablu), puternic reversibil, care permite controlul real al momentului în articulaţiefără senzor de forţă. Cinematica unică permite integrarea lui în structură graţieinovaţiilor mecanice speciale, precum articulaţia umărului şi încheieturaantebraţului. Rezultatul este o arhitectură deschisă, uşoară, antropomorfică, careevită încorsetarea braţului uman. Sunt prezentate pe scurt proiecte de aplicaţii în:recuperarea medicală, telechirurgie şi interfaţare haptică (RV)

Design of an innovative exoskeletal forearm-wrist mechanism

International audienceThis paper presents an innovative 3-joints structure designed as the forearm-wrist of a force controlled exoskeleton. It is composed of an open parallel mechanism both fitting the human forearm and able to rotate on its longitudinal joint (prono-supination), in a similar manner of the ulna-radius movement. This structure advantageously replaces circular guidings in terms of mass, volume and friction and can be freely scaled. A lightweight 3 dof forearm-wrist mechanism is proposed as an integral rotation module for the general-purpose arm exoskeleton ABLE 7 D

New dry friction model with load- and velocity- dependence and dynamic identification of multi-dof robots

International audience— Usually, the joint transmission friction model for robots is composed of a viscous friction force and of a constant dry sliding friction force. However, according to the Coulomb law, the dry friction force depends linearly on the load driven by the transmission, which has to be taken into account for robots working with large variation of the payload or inertial and gravity forces. Moreover, for robots actuating at low velocity, the Stribeck effect must be taken into account. This paper proposes a new inverse dynamic identification model for n degrees of freedom (dof) serial robot, where the dry sliding friction force is a linear function of both the dynamic and the external forces, with a velocity-dependent coefficient. A new sequential identification procedure is carried out. At a first step, the friction model parameters are identified for each joint (1 dof), moving one joint at a time (this step has been validated in [23]). At a second step, these values are fixed in the n dof dynamic model for the identification of all robot inertial and gravity parameters. For the two steps, the identification concatenates all the joint data collected while the robot is tracking planned trajectories with different payloads to get a global least squares estimation of inertial and new friction parameters. An experimental validation is carried out with an industrial 3 dof robot

Dynamic Modeling and Identification of Joint Drive with Load-Dependent Friction Model

International audienceFriction modeling is essential for joint dynamic identification and control. Joint friction is composed of a viscous and a dry friction force. According to Coulomb law, dry friction depends linearly on the load in the transmission. However, in robotics field, a constant dry friction is frequently used to simplify modeling, identification and control. That is not accurate enough for joints with large payload or inertial and gravity variations and actuated with transmissions as speed reducer, screw-nut or worm gear. A new joint friction model taking dynamic and external forces into account is proposed in this paper. A new identification process is proposed, merging all the joint data collected while the mechanism is tracking exciting trajectories and with different payloads, to get a global LS estimation in one step. An experimental validation is carried out with a prismatic joint composed of a Star high precision ball screw drive positioning unit

Dedicated and industrial robotic arms used as force feedback telerobots at the AREVA-La Hague recycling plant

ISBN: 978-1-4244-6635-1/10International audienceCEA LIST and AREVA have been developing remote operations devices, also called telerobotics for 15 years. These tools were designed for interventions in the AREVA nuclear spent fuel facilities hot cells. From these 15 years of joint research and development, several technological bricks have been industrialized and used at the AREVA La Hague facilities. This article presents some of these bricks and their industrial developments. The “TAO2000” CEA LIST telerobotics generic software controller will be first discussed. This controller has been used to teleoperate dedicated slave arms like the MT200 TAO (an evolution of the conventional wall-transmission mechanical telemanipulator (MSM)) as well as industrial robotic arms like the Stäubli RX robots. Both the MT200 TAO and Stäubli RX TAO telerobotics systems provide force-feedback and are now ready to be used as telemaintenance tools at the AREVA La Hague facilities. Two recent maintenance operations using these tools will be detailed at the end of this pape

Design and acceptability assessment of a new reversible orthosis

International audience— We present a new device aimed at being used for upper limb rehabilitation. Our main focus was to design a robot capable of working in both the passive mode (i.e. the robot shall be strong enough to generate human-like movements while guiding the weak arm of a patient) and the active mode (i.e. the robot shall be able of following the arm without disturbing human natural motion). This greatly challenges the design, since the system shall be reversible and lightweight while providing human compatible strength, workspace and speed. The solution takes the form of an orthotic structure, which allows control of human arm redundancy contrarily to clinically available upper limb rehabilitation robots. It is equipped with an innovative transmission technology, which provides both high gear ratio and fine reversibility. In order to evaluate the device and its therapeutic efficacy, we compared several series of pointing movements in healthy subjects wearing and not wearing the orthotic device. In this way, we could assess any disturbing effect on normal movements. Results show that the main movement characteristics (direction, duration, bell shape profile) are preserved

State of knowledge and current practices regarding concussion prevention and management: a survey among >2000 Frenchspeaking stakeholders

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Evaluation of an MPN test for the rapid enumeration of Pseudomonas aeruginosa in hospital waters.

In this study, the performance of a new most probable number (MPN) test (Pseudalert®/Quanti-Tray®) for the enumeration of Pseudomonas aeruginosa from hospital waters was compared with both international and national membrane filtration-based culture methods for P. aeruginosa: ISO 16266:2006 and UK The Microbiology of Drinking Water – Part 8 (MoDW Part 8), which both use Pseudomonas CN agar. The comparison based on the calculation of mean relative differences between the two methods was conducted according to ISO 17994:2014. Using both routine hospital water samples (80 from six laboratories) and artificially contaminated samples (192 from five laboratories), paired counts from each sample and the enumeration method were analysed. For routine samples, there were insufficient data for a conclusive assessment, but the data do indicate at least equivalent performance of Pseudalert®/Quanti-Tray®. For the artificially contaminated samples, the data revealed higher counts of P. aeruginosa being recorded by Pseudalert®/Quanti-Tray®. The Pseudalert®/Quanti-Tray® method does not require confirmation testing for atypical strains of P. aeruginosa, saving up to 6 days of additional analysis, and has the added advantage of providing confirmed counts within 24–28 hours incubation compared to 40–48 hours or longer for the ISO 16266 and MoDW Part 8 methods

Elements of morphology: Standard terminology for the teeth and classifying genetic dental disorders

Dental anomalies occur frequently in a number of genetic disorders and act as major signs in diagnosing these disorders. We present definitions of the most common dental signs and propose a classification usable as a diagnostic tool by dentists, clinical geneticists, and other health care providers. The definitions are part of the series Elements of Morphology and have been established after careful discussions within an international group of experienced dentists and geneticists. The classification system was elaborated in the French collaborative network 'TÊTECOU' and the affiliated O-Rares reference/competence centers. The classification includes isolated and syndromic disorders with oral and dental anomalies, to which causative genes and main extraoral signs and symptoms are added. A systematic literature analysis yielded 408 entities of which a causal gene has been identified in 79%. We classified dental disorders in eight groups: dental agenesis, supernumerary teeth, dental size and/or shape, enamel, dentin, dental eruption, periodontal and gingival, and tumor-like anomalies. We aim the classification to act as a shared reference for clinical and epidemiological studies. We welcome critical evaluations of the definitions and classification and will regularly update the classification for newly recognized conditions

Document, create and translate knowledge: the mission of ReFORM, the Francophone IOC Research Centre for Prevention of Injury and Protection of Athlete Health

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has supported athletes’ health protection by funding Research Centres dedicated to prevention and treatment of sports-related injuries and illnesses. After establishing four centres in 2009, the IOC Research Centres network expanded to 9 Institutions in 2014 and the 2019 round recognised 11 centres. Here we introduce ReFORM — an international French-speaking network of five institutions.Peer reviewe