Motivated by the need to develop safe exoskeletons for collocated joint rehabilitation during the early stage of stroke recovery, this article presents a pantographic exoskeleton (PGE) capable of multi-degree-of-freedom motions in a single-joint collocated with the impaired joint. With minimum internal joint reactions in the presence of misalignment, the PGE “traces” the natural joint motion “like a pantograph” in the sagittal plane while performing in-bed rehabilitation, from which the joint parameters can be estimated for subsequent patient-specific motion training. An analytical model is presented to provide a rational basis for designing a collocated human-ankle/PGE mechanism, which has been numerically illustrated. The findings demonstrate that because the PGE joint do not restrict human ankle nature motion within the motion range of a typical ankle, it is less sensitive to joint misalignment as compared to conventional multijoint serial mechanisms that form a closed chain with the human limbs/joint. A prototype PGE has been designed; and its effectiveness for collocated ankle-joint manipulation has been experimentally investigated. Unlike conventional imaging methods that are prone to skin-marker errors and dependent on lumped-parameter approximations, the PGE directly measures the talus trajectory of the ankle-joint for characterizing its roll/slide motion and internal parameters.

中文翻译：

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基于新型受电弓外骨骼的并置关节设计及其在早期卒中康复中的应用

由于需要开发安全的外骨骼以在卒中恢复早期进行并置关节康复，因此提出了一种全景式外骨骼（PGE），该外骨骼可以在与受损关节并列的单关节中进行多自由度运动。在发生错位的情况下，通过最小的内部关节反应，PGE在进行床内康复时可以在矢状平面上“追踪”自然的关节运动“像受电弓一样”，从中可以估算出关节参数以用于随后的患者特定运动训练。提出了一种分析模型，为设计并置的人脚踝/ PGE机制提供了合理的基础，并已进行了数值说明。研究结果表明，由于PGE关节不会将人的脚踝自然运动限制在典型脚踝的运动范围内，因此与传统的多关节串联机制（与人的四肢/关节形成闭合链）相比，它对关节未对准的敏感性较低。已经设计了一个原型PGE。并已通过实验研究了其在并置踝关节操纵中的有效性。与容易出现皮肤标记错误并取决于集总参数近似值的常规成像方法不同，PGE直接测量踝关节的距骨轨迹以表征其滚动/滑动运动和内部参数。已经设计了一个原型PGE。并已通过实验研究了其对并置踝关节操纵的有效性。与容易出现皮肤标记错误并取决于集总参数近似值的常规成像方法不同，PGE直接测量踝关节的距骨轨迹以表征其滚动/滑动运动和内部参数。已经设计了一个原型PGE。并已通过实验研究了其在并置踝关节操纵中的有效性。与容易出现皮肤标记错误并取决于集总参数近似值的常规成像方法不同，PGE直接测量踝关节的距骨轨迹以表征其滚动/滑动运动和内部参数。