Cyborg Friday: DEKA Luke Arm Gets Smarter
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Friday, 30 of May , 2008 at 3:22 am
In February, we learned about Dean Kamen’s amazing Luke robotic prosthetic arm, which is way, way, way better than the current standard for prosthetic limbs. It looks like DEKA has put more than a little work into the arm system since then, focusing on what is probably the trickiest (and most important) aspect: how the user interacts with and controls the system.
The arm itself has 18 degrees of freedom, which is nearly as many as a human arm has. That’s a lot of control, which is great, but it becomes that much harder for the arm to be controlled. For most people, sensors on the arm read muscle signals from neurons in the upper body to determine what the user wants the arm to do. DEKA’s system adapts the arm to the user, rather than vice versa, and also allows for the use of macros to make common or repetitive tasks easier to accomplish. DEKA is also working on arms controlled directly with the brain, and part of the above video shows just how effective such an approach can be, as a man uses his mind to lift a cup to his mouth and take a drink, and then sets the cup down again without conscious thought. Simply incredible.
Comments (1)
Category: Cybernetics, Medical, Research
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Comment by Robert Walker
Made Wednesday, 8 of October , 2008 at 2:11 pm
I lost my left arm in a car accident last December. I would like to contact someone in the “DEKA LUCA ARM” group, to volunteer as a test pilot for any prosthetic arm research testing available. I read the article and watched the video by Evan Ackerman on Friday, 30 of May , 2008 at 3:22 am on website “Botjunkkie, article, Cyborg Friday: DEKA Luke Arm Gets Smarter”. Great article!!!! Can you help me????
Thank You
Robert Walker
Sr Engineer Toshiba Medical Systems
email ctfixer1@verizon.net or rwalker@tams.com
Phone, home 813-653-380
cell phone 813-841-2320