Risk Assessment and Mitigation Strategies for Active Lower Limb Exoskeletons

Schick, Johannes; Glaser, Markus; Kennel, Ralph

doi:10.1109/rams48030.2020.9153676

Cited by 4 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 15 publications

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“…The lower limb exoskeleton can be divided into powered exoskeleton and passive exoskeleton according to different functional principles ( Schick et al, 2020 ). The powered exoskeleton directly provides external energy to human motion, in which the actuators are used to convert hydraulic energy, electrical energy, or pneumatic energy into mechanical energy required by the human body ( Stauffer et al, 2009 ; Talaty et al, 2013 ; Tsukahara et al, 2015 ; Lovrenovic and Doumit, 2016 ; Li et al, 2017 ; Munera et al, 2017 ; Ding et al, 2018 ; Niu et al, 2018 ; Pan et al, 2018 ; Zhang et al, 2018 ; Chen et al, 2019 ; Schick et al, 2020 ). The powered exoskeleton has made remarkable achievements in human walking assistance ( Pardoel and Doumit, 2019 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hip–Knee Coupling Exoskeleton With Offset Theory for Walking Assistance

Sun

Chen³

2022

Front. Bioeng. Biotechnol.

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To alleviate the influence of aging on the elderly, a hip–knee coupling exoskeleton with offset theory is designed in this article to improve people’s athletic ability. With the novel design, the unique application strategy of the offset principle for hip and knee joints is developed, and a hip–knee coupling mechanism is proposed to solve the discrete power assistance problem for the knee joint. To acquire the success of the design, the mathematical model of the coupling mechanism is established to optimize the load environment of the exoskeleton system, and furthermore, an algorithm adapted to human movement is proposed to determine the monotonicity of the cam profiles. For the selection of the elastic parameters in the coupling mechanism, the sensitivity condition is proposed, and the human–machine interaction model of the KESM is further established. A man–machine coupling model was used to verify the scientificity of the exoskeleton design, and the comparison between the joint powers with or without exoskeleton indicated that the exoskeleton theoretically saved at least 20% of the human body’s energy.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hip–Knee Coupling Exoskeleton With Offset Theory for Walking Assistance

Sun

Chen³

2022

Front. Bioeng. Biotechnol.

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“…Despite the fact that soft tissue damage was consistently present in different reviews of adverse events [ 88 ], hazards [ 89 ], and risk management [ 90 ] for lower limb exoskeletons, research on shear stresses is still very limited. Records considering shear pressures and their limit for human safety were sensitively limited.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characterization and Evaluation of Human–Exoskeleton Interaction Dynamics: A Review

Massardi

Rodriguez-Cianca

Pinto-Fernández

et al. 2022

Sensors

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Exoskeletons and exosuits have witnessed unprecedented growth in recent years, especially in the medical and industrial sectors. In order to be successfully integrated into the current society, these devices must comply with several commercialization rules and safety standards. Due to their intrinsic coupling with human limbs, one of the main challenges is to test and prove the quality of physical interaction with humans. However, the study of physical human–exoskeleton interactions (pHEI) has been poorly addressed in the literature. Understanding and identifying the technological ways to assess pHEI is necessary for the future acceptance and large-scale use of these devices. The harmonization of these evaluation processes represents a key factor in building a still missing accepted framework to inform human–device contact safety. In this review, we identify, analyze, and discuss the metrics, testing procedures, and measurement devices used to assess pHEI in the last ten years. Furthermore, we discuss the role of pHEI in safety contact evaluation. We found a very heterogeneous panorama in terms of sensors and testing methods, which are still far from considering realistic conditions and use-cases. We identified the main gaps and drawbacks of current approaches, pointing towards a number of promising research directions. This review aspires to help the wearable robotics community find agreements on interaction quality and safety assessment testing procedures.

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“…Based on this literature analysis, we selected and merged the most relevant items in a non-comprehensive list of general hazardous events that, in our opinion, are likely to be shared between exoskeleton devices. We excluded AEs like falls and collisions, normally investigated during infield trials [16][17][18], being usually consequences of other primary AEs. Our list includes the following seven items:…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…-Misalignments: Offset between the exoskeleton and the human joints. Misalignments can be considered a source of hazards since they produce higher forces at the interface, thus contributing to skin injuries, discomfort, and pain [16,17,26]. Misalignments are a very important factor to negotiate when using or designing exoskeletons [1,[27][28][29][30] thus, it has been included to highlight the experience users might have with them.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Relevance of hazards in exoskeleton applications: a survey-based enquiry

Massardi

Pinto-Fernández

Babič

et al. 2023

J NeuroEngineering Rehabil

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Exoskeletons are becoming the reference technology for assistance and augmentation of human motor functions in a wide range of application domains. Unfortunately, the exponential growth of this sector has not been accompanied by a rigorous risk assessment (RA) process, which is necessary to identify the major aspects concerning the safety and impact of this new technology on humans. This situation may seriously hamper the market uptake of new products. This paper presents the results of a survey that was circulated to understand how hazards are considered by exoskeleton users, from research and industry perspectives. Our analysis aimed to identify the perceived occurrence and the impact of a sample of generic hazards, as well as to collect suggestions and general opinions from the respondents that can serve as a reference for more targeted RA. Our results identified a list of relevant hazards for exoskeletons. Among them, misalignments and unintended device motion were perceived as key aspects for exoskeletons’ safety. This survey aims to represent a first attempt in recording overall feedback from the community and contribute to future RAs and the identification of better mitigation strategies in the field.

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Risk Assessment and Mitigation Strategies for Active Lower Limb Exoskeletons

Cited by 4 publications

References 15 publications

Hip–Knee Coupling Exoskeleton With Offset Theory for Walking Assistance

Hip–Knee Coupling Exoskeleton With Offset Theory for Walking Assistance

Characterization and Evaluation of Human–Exoskeleton Interaction Dynamics: A Review

Relevance of hazards in exoskeleton applications: a survey-based enquiry

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