H-man: refinement of a planar, 2DOF robotic manipulandum for use in clinical settings and at home
With the expectation that the number of patients who require physical rehabilitation will continue to increase in the future, the current level of therapist and caregivers may not be able to cope with the demand for therapy. Robotic rehabilitation devices have the potential to address this problem a...
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| Format: | Final Year Project |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2016
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10356/68649 |
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| Institution: | Nanyang Technological University |
| Language: | English |
| Summary: | With the expectation that the number of patients who require physical rehabilitation will continue to increase in the future, the current level of therapist and caregivers may not be able to cope with the demand for therapy. Robotic rehabilitation devices have the potential to address this problem as noted by the results of recent research studies.
H-Man is a cost-effective, light-weight and easy to control robotic rehabilitation device that aims to enhance accessibility and affordability of therapy. Proven to be feasible in a clinical setting, H-Man is still currently in development and refinement.
The current controller is a Quansar QPIDe which can be cost prohibitive. This report has investigated and demonstrated that it is technically feasible to lower the cost of manufacturing and, hence, improve economic viability. This can be done by the implementation of an impedance controller on a cost effective microcontroller –Microchip’s dsPIC33EP256MU806.
The report details the implementation, discussion and evaluation of the microcontroller-based system. The proposed system architecture involving the HMan, microcontroller and a Unity based game was proven to work. The microcontroller is able to sample the H-Man joint space and obtain position of the end-effector, which was transmitted to the game as the avatar’s position. Haptic renderings of low level forces on the end-effector were implemented through the use of impedance control and motor control on the microcontroller. These forces guides the user’s arm toward different targets, certain distance apart, while the game provided visual feedback and stimuli. Two-way serial communication protocol between the microcontroller and game facilitated this process. |
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