This 'wearable robot' may help paralysed patients stand on their feet again

Paralysis

Zee Media Bureau

New Delhi: Scientists have come up with a wearable lower-limb robot exoskeleton that they claim might help paralysed patients regain ability to walk.

Wearable "robot-assisted training" is quickly emerging as a method that helps improve gait rehabilitation.

Now, researchers from Beihang University in China and Aalborg University in Denmark have designed a lower-limb robot exoskeleton - a wearable robot - that features natural knee movement to greatly improve patients' comfort and willingness to wear it for gait rehab.

The robotic exoskeleton is intended to help stroke patients strengthen their physical fitness, aid the rehabilitation training of paralysed patients, or to assist those who need help performing daily activities.

The team focused on the knee joint, one of the most complex mechanical systems within the human body and a critical player during gait.

The knee joint's motion is actuated by several skeletal muscles along its articular surfaces, and its centre of rotation moves.

Researchers wondered if a parallel mechanism similar to skeletal muscles would be useful for designing a bionic knee joint.

(With IANS inputs)