フィンレイ構造とケーブル駆動を組み合わせた高把持力ソフトハンド外骨格
A Soft High Force Hand Exoskeleton for Rehabilitation and Assistance of Spinal Cord Injury and Stroke Individuals
脊髄損傷や脳卒中患者のリハビリ・支援向けに、フィンレイ構造の指装具とケーブル駆動を組み合わせ、痛みを伴う圧迫を抑えつつ最大22Nの指先力を実現したソフトハンド外骨格を提案・試作した論文。
著者: Shuangyue Yu, Hadia Perez, James Barkas, Mohamed Mohamed, Mohamed Eldaly, Tzu-Hao Huang, Xiaolong Yang, Hao Su, Maria del Mar Cortes, Dylan J. Edwards
分類: cs.RO, cs.HC
原文アブストラクト
Individuals with spinal cord injury (SCI) and stroke who is lack of manipulation capability have a particular need for robotic hand exoskeletons. Among assistive and rehabilitative medical exoskeletons, there exists a sharp trade-off between device power on the one hand and ergonomics and portability on other, devices that provide stronger grasping assistance do so at the cost of patient comfort. This paper proposes using fin-ray inspired, cable-driven finger orthoses to generate high fingertip forces without the painful compressive and shear stresses commonly associated with conventional cable-drive exoskeletons. With combination cable-driven transmission and segmented-finger orthoses, the exoskeleton transmitted larger forces and applied torques discretely to the fingers, leading to strong fingertip forces. A prototype of the finger orthoses and associated cable transmission was fabricated, and force transmission tests of the prototype in the finger flexion mode demonstrated a 2:1 input-output ratio between cable tension and fingertip force, with a maximum fingertip force of 22 N. Moreover, the proposed design provides a comfortable experience for wearers thanks to its lightweight and conformal properties to the hands.
