Neurological injuries such as stroke and upper-limb amputation often lead to long-term motor impairments that require intensive and sustained rehabilitation. However, conventional rehabilitation approaches can be repetitive, resource-intensive, and difficult to personalize, limiting patient engagement and long-term effectiveness. At the same time, advanced digital rehabilitation technologies are often confined to specialized laboratories due to their complexity, cost, and limited portability. These challenges highlight the urgent need for scalable, engaging, and physiology-driven rehabilitation solutions that can be more easily integrated into real clinical practice and, in the future, home-based care.
The BRAINmade project addresses this need by developing an innovative platform that combines virtual reality (VR) with electromyography (EMG), a technology that records muscle activity. By translating users’ muscle signals into real-time actions within immersive virtual environments, the system aims to support more natural, engaging, and personalized motor training. The project builds on advances in neuroscience of embodiment and human–machine interaction, with the goal of creating rehabilitation experiences that better reflect how the brain and body work together during movement.
The overall objective of the project is to demonstrate the feasibility of a portable, scalable EMG–VR rehabilitation platform that supports both research and future clinical applications. To achieve this, the project developed a standalone VR application, integrated real-time muscle signal processing, and implemented remote monitoring tools that allow clinicians to track performance and adjust training parameters. Particular attention was devoted to user-centred design: individuals with upper-limb amputation were actively involved in testing and refining both the wearable sensing solutions and the virtual training scenarios, ensuring that the system addresses real user needs in terms of comfort, usability, and engagement.
Beyond its technical achievements, BRAINmade is expected to contribute to broader societal and healthcare goals. By lowering technological barriers and enabling more flexible deployment of advanced rehabilitation tools, the platform has the potential to improve access to intensive motor rehabilitation, support more personalized therapy pathways, and reduce inequalities in rehabilitation services. In the longer term, the project lays the groundwork for cost-effective digital neurorehabilitation solutions and future industrial exploitation in the growing field of immersive healthcare technologies.
