Using a humanoid robot to understand and repair sensorimotor control

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): We request funds to purchase a state-of-the-art robotic arm and hand from Shadow Robot. The device is actuated by 48 air muscles whose compliance and force-length characteristics are similar to human muscles. Furthermore the kinematic structure and range of motion are similar to the human upper limb. The robot will allow us to implement and test models of sensorimotor control. Such models are traditionally based on data from simple experimental tasks, and whether they can scale to the challenging control problems which the brain solves in everyday life remains an open question. The only way to address this question is to try to control a humanoid robot in the way we think the brain controls the body, see where our current ideas fail, and find ways to improve them. In addition the robot will facilitate research in novel technologies for neuro-prosthetic control, especially control of complex hand movements which are poorly understood. The robot will also be used in research on closed-loop brain-machine interfaces.