RESEARCH INITIATION AWARD: Investigating a new Generation of Assistive, Innovative Technologies (GAIT) for balance rehabilitation

研究启动奖为传统黑人学院和大学的教师提供支持，他们正在建立一个研究项目。期望该奖项有助于进一步提高教师的研究能力和效率，改善其所在机构的研究和教学，并使本科生参与研究经验。授予哥伦比亚特区大学的奖项在许多领域具有潜在的更广泛和社会影响。该项目旨在为老年中风幸存者探索一种创造性的、新颖的、具有潜在变革性的感官辅助设备，并有能力彻底改变目前使用的康复和平衡辅助模式。本科生将获得研究经验，并积极参与项目。总体研究目标是获得关于使用指尖或轻触的非机械稳定球杆以及多向部分体重支持（NaviGAITor）辅助的效果的新科学知识，用于中风幸存者的老年参与者的平衡康复。将评估参与者站立平衡、步态、功能和多感觉重加权，以及视觉、体感和前庭感觉系统如何适应增加的感觉信息以产生姿势反应。与目前使用的设备和方法相比，利用轻触作为老年人长期、永久康复援助的潜力是一种完全不同的方法。此外，该研究将研究一种独特的NaviGAITor系统，该系统可以实现多向运动范围，而不是传统的跑步机或直线行走的部分体重支持方法。从这项研究中获得的知识有可能造福社会，因为它的最终目标是减少老年中风幸存者的跌倒。

Research Initiation Awards provide support for faculty at Historically Black Colleges and Universities who are building a research program. It is expected that the award helps to further the faculty member's research capability and effectiveness, improves research and teaching at her home institution, and involves undergraduate students in research experiences. The award to the University of the District of Columbia has potential broader and societal impact in a number of areas. The project seeks to explore a creative, novel, and potentially transformative sensory aid for elderly stroke survivors with the capacity to revolutionize rehabilitative and balance aid paradigms currently used. Undergraduate students will gain research experiences and are actively involved in the project.The overarching research goal is to obtain new scientific knowledge on the effects of a non-mechanically stabilizing cue using fingertip or light touch, as well as a multidirectional partial bodyweight support (NaviGAITor) aid, for balance rehabilitation of elderly participants who are stroke survivors. Participant standing balance, gait, functionality and multisensory reweighting, as well as how the visual, somatosensory, and vestibular sensory systems adapt to added sensory information to yield a postural response, will be assessed. The potential of utilizing light touch to serve as a long-term, permanent rehabilitation aid for elderly participants is a radically different approach than devices and methods currently used. Further, the research will investigate a distinctive NaviGAITor system that allows for multidirectional range of motion, as opposed to the traditional with-treadmill or straight-path walking partial bodyweight support approaches. The knowledge resulting from this research has the potential to benefit society in that it ultimately aims at reducing falls in elderly stroke survivors.