Although much equipment for physical therapy has been developed, equipment to improve the quality of physical therapy is scarce. We propose a robotic biofeedback exercise device that can display human joint torque and muscle force during training without a problematic electromyogram (EMG). The purpose is to increase the therapeutic value by understanding a person's condition during exercise and to provide an incentive to improve performance. The manipulator supports lower limb rehabilitation in the sagittal plane. With its ability to adjust the maximum speed and the time constant, the manipulator provides simultaneous and safe isokinetic exercise for the knee and hip joints. This paper describes the estimation of the human joint torque and muscle force. The display of the joint torque and the muscle force is realized during exercise of the knee joint using the developed manipulator. The estimation of the muscle force from Crowninshield's method and Hase's method generally agrees with the EMG.

No abstract

This paper proposes a new concept of robotic ex ercise that displays human muscle force during rehabilitation procedures. The estimation is made by combination of an isokinetic dynamometer improved from its original usage for rehabilitation and a conventional muscle force estimation method based on a musculo-skeletal model which has been applied for human gait analysis_ The novel isokinetic dynamometer the authors developed has a force sensor for the musculo-skeletal model analysis, and provides an arbitrary training trajectory control function. The musculo-skeletal model analysis is constructed limitedly to the under limb movement, and the muscle force estimation is made in the thigh area by employing the two optimization methods. As a result of experiments, we confirmed that there is really not much difference between the results of two methods.