While traditional prosthetic limbs rely on complex robotic control systems to mimic human limb movement, an interesting new approach has allowed a bionic leg to read activity via an interface between an amputee's residual muscles and muscle-sensing electrodes in order to control the bionic limb through direct neuromodulation.
The results of the trial carried out by a team based at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), published in Nature Medicine and reported in the Guardian, show that patients demonstrated a 41% higher maximum walking speed using the proposed new bionic leg, compared with users of conventional bionic legs, as well as improved gait on various terrains. Users of the new bionic leg also adapted to obstacles commonly found in real-world conditions in an improved manner in comparison to users of conventional prosthetics.
The hope of the team at MIT is that this new approach will be commercialised in the next five years. As such, it looks like a great improvement in prosthetics is on the horizon.
"When the person can directly control and feel the movement of the prosthesis it becomes truly part of the person's anatomy. That can be quite emotional for the subjects that undergo this procedure."
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