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• Background

Virtual Immersive Environments and Motion Analysis for Advanced Rehabilitation

Apply virtual reality technology to improve the design of prosthetic limbs.

Collaborators

• Roy K. Aaron, Principal Investigator, Brown University
• Deborah McK. Ciombor, Providence VA Medical Center
• Samuel Fulcomer, Brown University

Summary

With Research Alliance support, this team will expand their work to understand human movement and the design of artificial limbs. The team will use Research Alliance funding to integrate virtual reality technology with existing methods of motion analysis to create prosthetic limbs that more closely simulate normal human movement.

To conduct this research, the team will use a specialized treadmill and motion platform and 3D video projection to create a virtual environment in which scientists can analyze the gait of amputees in a realistic movement scenario. The system places a patient on a hydraulic motion platform and projects a virtual environment on screens around the platform in which the patient "moves." The team can then monitor exact body position and changes in limb articulations.

Insights gleaned from this process can be immediately applied to design artificial limbs that react to a person's actual skeletal and muscular movements.