CONTROL SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR GAIT DEVICES

• US 20130218295A1
• Filed: 02/15/2013
• Published: 08/22/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 02/17/2012
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Ossur Iceland ehf
• Original Assignee: SpringActive, Inc.
• Inventors: Holgate, Matthew Aaron
• Application Number:
  US13/767,945
• Publication Number:
  US 20130218295A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 623/25
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2/60 Artificial legs or feet or parts thereof
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2/72 Bioelectric control, e.g. myoelectric
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2002/704 computer-controlled, e.g. robotic control
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2002/762 for measuring dimensions, e.g. a distance
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2002/7625 for measuring angular position
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2002/7635 for measuring force, pressure or mechanical tension
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2002/764 for measuring acceleration
• CPC Class Codes: A61F 2002/7645 for measuring torque, e.g. hinge or turning moment, moment of force

Abstract

Methods for controlling gait devices include measuring kinematic and/or loading states of limb or robotic segments; conditioning the resulting state measurement by any combination or order of integration, differentiation, filtering, and amplification; transforming conditioned state measurements by coordinate transformation; optionally conditioning the transformed state measurements a second time in a manner similar to the first conditioning step; and using the transformed or conditioned transformed state measurements as independent variables in a predetermined reference function to calculate a desired reference command for any number of actuators.

Claims

1. A method for controlling gait devices, wherein gait devices are robotic devices worn by a user to replace limbs or assist movement, the method comprising:

Measuring, by use of one or more sensors, one or more physical states of one or more mobile bodies, wherein each mobile body comprises a limb segment or robot segment;

conditioning the measured physical state(s);

transforming the conditioned physical state(s); and

generating a reference command for control of one or more actuators using commands derived from the input of the transformed physical state(s) into a reference function, wherein the reference function is based on at least one gait activity.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of the physical states is a kinematic state, wherein a kinematic state is defined as angular position, linear position, linear velocity, angular velocity, linear acceleration, or angular acceleration.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one of the physical states is a loading state, wherein a loading state is defined as a moment or force applied to or internal to a limb segment or robot segment.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the physical states are made up of any combination of kinematic or loading states.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the sensors are coupled to limb segments.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the sensors are coupled to robotic segments.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein conditioning is realized by one or more conditioning method selected from the group consisting of Kalman filtering, use of a transfer function, integration, differentiation, amplification by a non-zero gain, and addition of a constant offset.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein transformation is realized by one or more transformation method selected from the group consisting of rotations, dilations, orthogonal or oblique projections, the identity transformation, changes of coordinate systems, changes of scale, and mathematical functions.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the steps consisting of conditioning and transformation are reversed.

10. A method for controlling gait devices, wherein gait devices are robotic devices worn by a user to replace limbs or assist movement, the method comprising:

Measuring by use of one or more sensors one or more physical states of one or more mobile bodies, wherein each mobile body comprises a limb segment or a robot segment;

conditioning the measured physical state(s);

transforming the conditioned physical state(s);

conditioning the transformed physical state(s); and

generating a reference command for control of one or more actuators using commands derived from the input of the conditioned transformed physical state(s) into a reference function, wherein the reference function is based on at least two gait activities.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein at least one of the physical states is a kinematic state, wherein a kinematic state is defined as angular position, linear position, linear velocity, angular velocity, linear acceleration, or angular acceleration.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein at least one of the physical states is a loading state, wherein a loading state is defined as a moment or force applied to or internal to a limb segment or robot segment.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the physical states are made up of any combination of kinematic or loading states.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the sensors are coupled to limb segments.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein the sensors are coupled to robotic segments.

16. The method of claim 10, wherein conditioning is realized by one or more conditioning method selected from the group consisting of Kalman filtering, use of a transfer function, integration, differentiation, amplification by a non-zero gain, and addition of a constant offset.

17. The method of claim 10, wherein transformation is realized by one or more transformation method selected from the group consisting of rotations, dilations, orthogonal or oblique projections, the identity transformation, changes of coordinate systems, changes of scale, and mathematical functions.