Hilen Rocha, Abdulsahib Al Hazza, Ahmed Shehab, Abdull Aziz Alkharas, Shramana Ghosh
Restoration of mobility following injuries like fractures, surgery, stroke or spinal cord injuries is a major task of neurorehabilitation. Thus, we design and construct a mechanized wearable orthotic device to be deployed in parallel to the human body and to enable the repetitive practice of gait like patterns without needing external help. The orthotic device is based on a six-bar linkage that has been designated to guide the lower limb joint kinematics to replicate a natural pysiological walking gait. The project will focus on design and development of a physical prototype of the orthotic, and movement analysis of healthy subjects with and without the orthotic device using motion capture, force plate and electromyogram (EGM) studies to test the kinematics, ground reaction forces, and muscle activation patterns during walking respectively. Our initial results show that the six bar linkages mimic the human walking motion, which is done by simulation in CalState Fullerton’s kinematics lab.