Muscle activation patterns during plantarflexion-assisted walking

随着技术的进步和世界人口的老龄化，预计下肢外骨骼将变得更加普遍。然而，在降低使用这些外骨骼行走所需的代谢成本方面，仍然存在很大的障碍。由于行走在很大程度上是一种无意识的自动活动，外骨骼的使用者通常不会减少肌肉活动，以受益于所提供的辅助力，并以适得其反的方式调整步态。这项研究旨在提高我们对这些障碍的理解，以通过健康人体受试者的对照实验来降低步行的代谢成本。了解外骨骼对这些外力的适应性对于设计能够有效补充和配合用户的外骨骼非常重要。在第一年和第二年，我们开发了一种定制的脚踝外骨骼试验台，它可以提供精确的足屈辅助，以便进行上述实验。踝关节外骨骼试验台需要具有基于踝关节角度和其他输入来控制施加的扭矩的功能。通过将致动器与外骨骼中的运动捕捉系统和传感器同步，开发的外骨骼能够根据参与者的步态向他们提供精确的定时帮助。此外，还对外骨骼中人类对外部辅助力的适应进行了综述。

As technology advances and world population ages, lower‐limb exoskeletons are expected to become more widespread. However, there are still substantial barriers in reducing the metabolic cost required for walking using these exoskeletons. Because walking is largely an unconscious and automated activity, users of exoskeletons often do not reduce their muscular activity to benefit from the assistive force provided and adjust their gait in ways that are counterproductive. This research aims to improve our understanding of these barriers to reduce the metabolic costs of walking through controlled experiments with healthy human subjects. It is important to understand the adaptations to these external forces to design exoskeletons that can effectively complement and cooperate with its user human user.In the first and second year, a custom ankle exoskeleton testbed that can provide precise plantarflexion assistance in order to perform the experiments stated above was developed. The ankle exoskeleton testbed needs to have the function to control the torque exerted based on the angle of the ankle as well as other inputs. By synchronising the actuators with a motion capture system and sensors in the exoskeleton, the developed exoskeleton is able to provide precisely timed assistance to the participants depending on their gait phase. Additionally, a review on human adaptations to external assistive forces in exoskeletons was conducted.