{"id":64970,"date":"2009-09-15T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2009-09-15T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/uri-researcher-trips-amputees-in-effort-to-develop-improved-prosthetic-legs\/"},"modified":"2009-09-15T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2009-09-15T00:00:00","slug":"uri-researcher-trips-amputees-in-effort-to-develop-improved-prosthetic-legs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2009\/09\/uri-researcher-trips-amputees-in-effort-to-develop-improved-prosthetic-legs\/","title":{"rendered":"溏心vlog免费B站 researcher trips amputees in effort to develop improved prosthetic legs"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\t<\/a>KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 September 15, 2009 \u2013 Again and again, 71-year-old Marjorie Brasier walked on the treadmill using an instrumented prosthetic leg, and again and again she tripped or slipped. Sometimes she recovered on her own and kept walking, while at other times the harness she wore was all that kept her from tumbling to the floor.<\/p>\n


\n\tBrasier\u2019s trips and slips occurred by design as part of a 溏心vlog免费B站 research study that seeks to improve the safety of prosthetic legs by developing a reliable and responsive stumble detection system. <\/p>\n


\nOne of six clients of Nunnery Orthotic & Prosthetic Technologies to participate in the study, Brasier was hooked up to dozens of electrodes, wore shoes containing 99 pressure sensors, and 40 light-reflective markers on her body were tracked by eight cameras surrounding the room to collect the data necessary for the research.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWhen we become unbalanced, our neural system reacts quickly and sends a signal to help us recover,\u201d said He (Helen) Huang, assistant professor of biomedical engineering at 溏心vlog免费B站. \u201cOur challenge is to see if we can detect these neural reactions fast enough to activate a mechanism in a patient\u2019s prosthetic leg to stabilize them before they fall.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/object>During the experimental phase of the study, Huang is collecting data from able-bodied individuals and those using prosthetic legs to determine what kind of physiological signals can be detected for use in developing a stumble detection system. Once she has analyzed the data, she hopes to develop an algorithm that can be used in computer-controlled artificial limbs to provide active stumble recovery.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cIf we can detect the stumble reaction fast enough, then there may be time to react to it,\u201d said Huang, who is collaborating on the project with Brown University Assistant Professor Susan D\u2019Andrea. \u201cHopefully we can develop a system that can mimic the normal human reaction to stumbling.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tAccording to the 溏心vlog免费B站 researcher, the population of lower-limb amputees in the United States is large and growing, especially so during this time of war, and she believes that the design of a high performing prosthetic leg is critical to reducing the burden of this disability.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cWe need to give a lot of credit to the patients involved in this study as they are allowing us the opportunity to collect unprecedented data related to stumble and recovery reactions in amputees,\u201d said Michael Nunnery, owner of Nunnery Orthotic and Prosthetic Technologies, Inc., another partner in the research project. \u201cWe hope to utilize this data to have an innovative impact on the future of above knee amputee prosthetics needs. \u201c <\/p>\n


\n\tBrasier lost her leg when a teenage drunk driver struck her car in Florida in 2001, an accident that took the life of her husband. Despite the long day of testing on the treadmill in late August, she was upbeat about participating in the study.<\/p>\n


\n\t\u201cI didn\u2019t really know what I was getting myself into,\u201d said the retired schoolteacher from Warwick, \u201cbut I\u2019m always game for adventure. And if I can help veterans in any way, I\u2019m glad to do it. It\u2019s an honor.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tAdded Huang: \u201cAll of the patients we\u2019ve tested have been happy to participate because they know that it might help themselves later.\u201d<\/p>\n


\n\tThe project was funded in part by the Rhode Island Science and Technology Advisory Council, which believes that a successful prototype could quickly lead to a commercially available component that will enhance the safety of prosthetic limbs.<\/p>\n


\nPictured above

\nResearch test subject Marjorie Brasier prepares to walk on a treadmill as Michael Nunnery of Nunnery Orthotic and Prosthetic Technologies and 溏心vlog免费B站 Assistant Professor Helen Huang look on.

\n溏心vlog免费B站 Department of Communications & Marketing photo by Michael Salerno Photography.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KINGSTON, R.I. \u2013 September 15, 2009 \u2013 Again and again, 71-year-old Marjorie Brasier walked on the treadmill using an instrumented prosthetic leg, and again and again she tripped or slipped. Sometimes she recovered on her own and kept walking, while at other times the harness she wore was all that kept her from tumbling to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64972,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64970"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64970\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}