Development of a new method to increase the degrees of freedom of myoelectric upper-limb prostheses and construction of a new neuromuscular model to improve their controllability

Project Information

ADCOMP

Grant agreement ID: 25056

Start date 1 April 2006

End date 31 March 2008

Funded under

• Human resources and Mobility in the specific programme for research, technological development and demonstration "Structuring the European Research Area" under the Sixth Framework Programme 2002-2006

Total cost € 0,00

EU contribution € 151 854,00

Coordinated by

SCUOLA SUPERIORE DI STUDI UNIVERSITARI E DI PERFEZIONAMENTO SANT'ANNA
Italy

Objective

Prostheses are artificial replacements of body parts that have been removed, e.g. by amputation following a traumatic event or a disease. Currently, three types of prosthetic hands are commercially available;
- cosmetic: passive devices with a simple aesthetic purpose,
- body-powered: powered and controlled by body movements, generally by shoulder or back muscles, and
- myoelectric: electrically powered and controlled by electromyographic signals, which are the weak electrical signals produced by contracting muscles.

These devices are still too simple to mimic the functionality of the natural lost limb because they have only one or two degrees of freedom (d.o.f.s) which allow a very limited variety of movements. In addition, their control is just in o n/off or in simple proportional mode, which is quite far from the natural way of controlling movements.

On the contrary, robotics hands are highly sophisticated devices with several d.o.f.s; however, they are unsuitable as prosthesis due to their rather bul ky size and control complexity. The aim of this multidisciplinary project is to construct an innovative type of myoelectric prosthetic hand bearing a superior functionality and a simple controllability, providing upper-limb amputees with a device that will be the closest ever reached to the real human hand.

To this end, a highly innovative biomimetic interdisciplinary approach will be used:
- a novel model of the human neuromuscular system will be constructed using system identification tools to obtain a m ore natural movement and control of the fingers;
- a powerful statistical technique (ICA) will be employed to increase the number of controlling signals obtained from the muscles of the subject's stump and thus the number of d.o.f.s highly increasing the variety of movements and functionality of prosthetic hands.

The same approach has the potential to be employed successfully also to increase the functionality of other assistive devices (exoskeletons).

Fields of science

• engineering and technology › electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering › electronic engineering › signal processing
• engineering and technology › electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering › electronic engineering › robotics
• medical and health sciences › medical biotechnology › implants

Keywords

• Artificial Hand
• Blind Source Separation
• Independent Component Analysis
• Medical Engineering
• Myoelectric Prostheses
• Neuroscience
• System Identification
• surface Electromyography

Programme(s)

• FP6-MOBILITY - Human resources and Mobility in the specific programme for research, technological development and demonstration "Structuring the European Research Area" under the Sixth Framework Programme 2002-2006

Topic(s)

• MOBILITY-2.1 - Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowships (EIF)

Call for proposal

FP6-2004-MOBILITY-5
See other projects for this call

Funding Scheme

EIF - Marie Curie actions-Intra-European Fellowships

Coordinator

SCUOLA SUPERIORE DI STUDI UNIVERSITARI E DI PERFEZIONAMENTO SANT'ANNA

• Address: Piazza martiri della liberta 33 ; Pisa ; Italy
• EU contribution: € 0,00