Optimal exoskeleton design and effective human-in-the-loop control frameworks for rehabilitation robotics

Official URL: http://risc01.sabanciuniv.edu/record=b1586868 (Table of Contents)

Attention, since they decrease the cost of repetitive movement therapies, enable quantitative measurement of the patient progress and promise development of more e ective rehabilitation protocols. The goal of this dissertation is to provide systematic frameworks for optimal design of rehabilitation robots and e ective delivery of therapeutic exercises. The design framework is built upon identification and categorization of the design requirements, and satisfaction of them through several design stages. In particular, type selection is performed to ensure imperative design requirements of safety, ergonomy and wearability, optimal dimensional synthesis is undertaken to maximize global kinematic and dynamic performance defined over the singularity-free workspace volume, while workspace optimization is performed to utilize maximum singularity-free device workspace computed via Grassmann line theory. Then, humanin- the-loop controllers that ensure coupled stability of the human-robot system are implemented in the robot task space using appropriate error metrics. The design framework is demonstrated on a forearm-wrist exoskeleton, since forearm and wrist rotations are critical in performing activities of daily living and recovery of these joints is essential for achieving functional independence of patients. In particular, a non-symmetric 3RPS-R mechanism is selected as the underlying kinematics type and the performance improvements due to workspace and multi-criteria optimizations are experimentally characterized as 27 % larger workspace volume, 32 % higher position control bandwidth and 17 % increase in kinematic isotropy when compared to a similar device in the literature. The exoskeleton is also shown to feature high passive back-driveability and accurate sti ness rendering capability, even under open-loop impedance control. Local controllers to accommodate for each stage of rehabilitation therapies are designed for the forearm-wrist exoskeleton in SO(3): trajectory tracking controllers are designed for early stages of rehabilitation when severely injured patients are kept passive, impedance controllers are designed to render virtual tunnels implementing forbidden regions in the device workspace and allowing for haptic interactions with virtual environments, and passive contour tracking controllers are implemented to allow for rehabilitation exercises that emphasize coordination and synchronization of multi degrees-of-freedom movements, while leaving the exact timing along the desired contour to the patient. These local controllers are incorporated into a multi-lateral shared controller architecture, which allows for patients to train with online virtual dynamic tasks in collaboration with a therapist. Utilizing this control architecture not only enables the shift of control authority of each agent so that therapists can guide or evaluate movements of patients or share the control with them, but also enables the implementation of remote and group therapies, as well as remote assessments. The proposed control framework to deliver e ective robotic therapies can ensure active involvement of patients through online modification of the task parameters, while simultaneously guaranteeing their safety. In particular, utilizing passive velocity field control and extending it with a method for online generation of velocity fields for parametric curves, temporal, spatial and assistive aspects of a desired task can be seamlessly modified online, while ensuring passivity with respect to externally applied forces. Through human subject experiments, this control framework is shown to be e ective in delivering evidence-based rehabilitation therapies, providing assistance as-needed, preventing slacking behavior of patients, and delivering repetitive therapies without exact repetition. Lastly, to guide design of e ective rehabilitation treatment protocols, a set of healthy human subject experiments are conducted in order to identify underlying principles of adaptation mechanism of human motor control system. In these catch-trial based experiments, equivalent transfer functions are utilized during execution of rhythmic dynamic tasks. Statistical evidence suggests that i) force feedback is the dominant factor that guides human adaptation while performing fast rhythmic dynamic tasks rather than the visual feedback and ii) as the e ort required to perform the task increases, the rate of adaptation decreases; indicating a fundamental trade-o between task performance and level of force feedback provided.