A robotic exoskeleton has been created by University Texas at Austin students, with it being manufactured in order to help those who have suffered a stroke or spinal cord injury by granting them extra physical strength during the rehabilitation process.
The exoskeleton, named HARMONY, attaches to the user’s back and arms and is helping those suffering with the physical side-effects of stroke with their movement, enabling them to complete day-to-day tasks by granting them artificial strength.
Speaking to the Texas Standard, HARMONY developer Dr. Ashish Deshpande said: “Just movement itself helps at the joints level and then it helps at the muscle level as well,” Deshpande says. “But then what we want to get at is actually the brain level – or the neural level. So if you had a stroke, you’d want to exploit what’s called brain plasticity – so that’s the ability of the brain to recover some function. And to achieve that you want to move the body in the right fashion.”
The HARMONY helps users achieve this by granting them the ability to move in a manner that wouldn’t be possible if they had suffered neural injury due to a stroke, though Dr. Deshpande is also thinking in broader terms regarding the potential application of the exoskeleton, with him also testing its use for injuries that may have been picked up in a sporting activity.
“It clearly has muscular-skeletal applications – someone with a shoulder replacement or orthopedic injury,” Dr, Deshpande continued, adding: “It very well may have some implications for sports rehabilitation after an injury or perhaps even sports enhancement.”
Weirdly, the inspiration for the HARMONY came from the suit donned by Robert Downey Jr. in the Iron Man movies, with a framed poster of a shot from one of the films adorning the wall of Deshpande’s laboratory, along with a photo of The Terminator’s T-800. However, Deshpande noted that the HARMONY isn’t intended to grant superhuman strength, but rather to give them a helping hand when they are physically at their weakest.
Dr. Deshpande is currently enabling those who have suffered a stroke or spinal injuries to sign up to test out the HARMONY.
