FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation Studies

This paper presents a simulation of bipedal locomotion to generate stimulation pulses for activating muscles for paraplegic walking with wheel walker using functional electrical stimulation (FES) with spring brake orthosis (SBO). A new methodology for paraplegic gait, based on exploiting natural dyn...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: R. Jailani, M. O. Tokhi, S. C. Gharooni, B. S. K. K. Ibrahim
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Wiley 2011-01-01
Series:Applied Bionics and Biomechanics
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.3233/ABB-2011-0001
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1850223819873058816
author R. Jailani
M. O. Tokhi
S. C. Gharooni
B. S. K. K. Ibrahim
author_facet R. Jailani
M. O. Tokhi
S. C. Gharooni
B. S. K. K. Ibrahim
author_sort R. Jailani
collection DOAJ
description This paper presents a simulation of bipedal locomotion to generate stimulation pulses for activating muscles for paraplegic walking with wheel walker using functional electrical stimulation (FES) with spring brake orthosis (SBO). A new methodology for paraplegic gait, based on exploiting natural dynamics of human gait, is introduced. The work is a first effort towards restoring natural like swing phase in paraplegic gait through a new hybrid orthosis, referred to as spring brake orthosis (SBO). This mechanism simplifies the control task and results in smooth motion and more-natural like trajectory produced by the flexion reflex for gait in spinal cord injured subjects. SBO can eliminate reliance on the withdrawal reflex and foot-ground clearance without extra upper body effort. The stored energy in the spring of SBO is used to replace stimulation pulses in knee flexion and reduce total required torque for the paraplegic walking with wheel walker. The study is carried out with a model of humanoid with wheel walker using the Visual Nastran (Vn4D) dynamic simulation software. Stimulated muscle model of quadriceps is developed for knee extension. Fuzzy logic control (FLC) is developed in Matlab/Simulink to regulate the muscle stimulation pulse-width required to drive FES-assisted walking gait and the computed motion is visualised in graphic animation from Vn4D. The simulation results show that SBO can be successfully used with FES for paraplegic walking with wheel walker with all the advantages discussed over the current hybrid orthoses available.
format Article
id doaj-art-57924de6e8de465589ea681be0104eac
institution OA Journals
issn 1176-2322
1754-2103
language English
publishDate 2011-01-01
publisher Wiley
record_format Article
series Applied Bionics and Biomechanics
spelling doaj-art-57924de6e8de465589ea681be0104eac2025-08-20T02:05:49ZengWileyApplied Bionics and Biomechanics1176-23221754-21032011-01-018111512610.3233/ABB-2011-0001FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation StudiesR. Jailani0M. O. Tokhi1S. C. Gharooni2B. S. K. K. Ibrahim3Department of Automatic Control and System Engineering, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UKDepartment of Automatic Control and System Engineering, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UKDepartment of Automatic Control and System Engineering, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UKDepartment of Automatic Control and System Engineering, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UKThis paper presents a simulation of bipedal locomotion to generate stimulation pulses for activating muscles for paraplegic walking with wheel walker using functional electrical stimulation (FES) with spring brake orthosis (SBO). A new methodology for paraplegic gait, based on exploiting natural dynamics of human gait, is introduced. The work is a first effort towards restoring natural like swing phase in paraplegic gait through a new hybrid orthosis, referred to as spring brake orthosis (SBO). This mechanism simplifies the control task and results in smooth motion and more-natural like trajectory produced by the flexion reflex for gait in spinal cord injured subjects. SBO can eliminate reliance on the withdrawal reflex and foot-ground clearance without extra upper body effort. The stored energy in the spring of SBO is used to replace stimulation pulses in knee flexion and reduce total required torque for the paraplegic walking with wheel walker. The study is carried out with a model of humanoid with wheel walker using the Visual Nastran (Vn4D) dynamic simulation software. Stimulated muscle model of quadriceps is developed for knee extension. Fuzzy logic control (FLC) is developed in Matlab/Simulink to regulate the muscle stimulation pulse-width required to drive FES-assisted walking gait and the computed motion is visualised in graphic animation from Vn4D. The simulation results show that SBO can be successfully used with FES for paraplegic walking with wheel walker with all the advantages discussed over the current hybrid orthoses available.http://dx.doi.org/10.3233/ABB-2011-0001
spellingShingle R. Jailani
M. O. Tokhi
S. C. Gharooni
B. S. K. K. Ibrahim
FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation Studies
Applied Bionics and Biomechanics
title FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation Studies
title_full FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation Studies
title_fullStr FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation Studies
title_full_unstemmed FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation Studies
title_short FES-Assisted Walking with Spring Brake Orthosis: Simulation Studies
title_sort fes assisted walking with spring brake orthosis simulation studies
url http://dx.doi.org/10.3233/ABB-2011-0001
work_keys_str_mv AT rjailani fesassistedwalkingwithspringbrakeorthosissimulationstudies
AT motokhi fesassistedwalkingwithspringbrakeorthosissimulationstudies
AT scgharooni fesassistedwalkingwithspringbrakeorthosissimulationstudies
AT bskkibrahim fesassistedwalkingwithspringbrakeorthosissimulationstudies