Design and control of an exoskeleton system for human upper-limb motion assist

In this paper; we introduce a 3-DOF exoskeleton system to assist the human upper-limb motion (shoulder flexion-extension motion, shoulder adduction-abduction motion, and elbow flexion-extension motion) for daily activity and rehabilitation. The electromyogram (EMG) signals of human muscles are important signals to understand how the patient intends to move. The proposed exoskeleton automatically assists the patient ´s motion for daily activity and rehabilitation mainly based on the skin surface EMG signals. Even though the EMG signals contain very important information, however, it is not very easy to predict the patient upper-limb motion (elbow and shoulder motion) based on the EMG signals in a short time because of the difficulty in using the EMG signals as the controller input signals. In order to cope with this problem, fuzzy-neuro control has been applied to realize the sophisticated real-time control of the exoskeleton system for motion assist of the patient. Experiment has been performed to evaluate the proposed exoskeleton and its control system.