• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2008.06a
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• pp.37-38
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• 2008

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.39 no.6
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• pp.617-624
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• 2015

This paper describes the development of a wearable robot to assist the elbow muscle for use by elderly workers in aging societies. Various previously developed wearable robots have drawbacks in terms of their price, portability, and slow recognition of the wearer's intention. In this paper, emphasis is placed on the following features to minimize these drawbacks. The first feature is that an actuator is attached only at the elbow joint that withstands the highest moment during arm motion to reduce the weight, volume, and price of the robot and increase its practicality. The second is that operation of the wearable robot is divided into two modes, a tracking mode and a muscle strengthening mode, and the robot can automatically switch between these modes by analyzing the wearer's intention through the brachial muscle strength measuring device developed in this study. The assistive performance of the developed wearable robot is experimentally verified by motion tracking experiments without an external load and muscle strengthening experiments with an external load. During the muscle strengthening experiments, the power of the muscle of the upper arm is measured by a commercial electromyography (EMG) sensor. Motion tracking performance at a speed of $120^{\circ}/s$ and muscle assistance of over 60 % were obtained using our robot.

• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.387-396
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• 2022

Logistics industry still heavily relies on human labor in many field processes. However, robot applications in logistics are rapidly increasing, encouraged by technological progresses in robotics and cheaper robot solutions from competition between robot suppliers. Effectiveness of logistics automation are higher productivity for cost reduction and increased process capabilities for better profit, which is witnessed in many fields of logistics industry. In this paper, differences in logistics services - contract logistics, parcel, and fulfillment - are addressed, and characteristics and issues in application of various kinds of logistics robots such as AGV, AMR, ASRS, box/piece handling robots and robotic wearable devices are discussed. The advantages from flexibility and scalability of logistics automation by robots will benefit the future logistics business.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.45 no.6
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• pp.1004-1016
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• 2021

This study aims to derive the design requirements for functional clothing worn with military wearable robots using a survey of people with military experience. Specifically, 982 adult males with military and muscular exercise experience were surveyed for their demands for the clothing worn with wearable robots during military activities. The study showed that it is necessary to develop functional clothing worn inside robots suitable for frequent movements of soldiers to improve their comfort level of wearable robots. The surveyed soldiers indicated that they preferred the top and bottom clothing with high-pressure levels because the upper body felt fatigued during transportation, while both the upper and lower body got exhausted during marches. The survey of design requirements revealed that the participants preferred a top with long sleeves and a bottom with ankle-length leggings in color similar to current military uniforms. We conclude that it is important to design functional clothing worn inside wearable robots in different forms depending on frequent movements, e.g., with differentiated pressures and material placements.

• Journal of KIISE
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• v.42 no.12
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• pp.1544-1550
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• 2015

Recently, the development of practical wearable robot interfaces has resulted in the emergence of wearable robots such as arm prosthetics or lower-limb exoskeletons. In this paper, we propose a novel method of wrist movement intention estimation based on a regression technique using electromyography of human bio-signals. In daily life, changes in user arm position changes cause decreases in performance by modulating EMG signals. Therefore, we propose an estimation method for robust wrist movement intention for arm position changes, combining several movement intention models based on the regression technique trained by different arm positions. In our experimental results, our method estimates wrist movement intention more accurately than previous methods.

• Journal of rehabilitation welfare engineering & assistive technology
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.15-22
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• 2012

The mechanical system of wearable walking assist robot needs to be optimized for adapting with human body structure and the planned control algorithm should have a secure procedure when a incongruity situation which can cause musculoskeletal injury occurs because a wearable robot is attached to a body. The understanding of walking or musculoskeletal motions characteristics must be preceeded and analyzed for developing novel wearable walking assist robot. In this study we tried to find out the capacities of powers and torques of joint actuators to design optimized performances of system and to obtain the analysis data to figure out the characteristics of joint movements during some types of walk. The major types of walk and motion are stair climbing and descending, sit-to-stand motion, and slope walking. In this study all these motions were analyzed experimentally except slope walking.

• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.323-329
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• 2020

This paper presents a control algorithm for a wearable walking aid robot for subjects with paraplegia after stroke. After a stroke, a slow, asymmetrical and unstable gait pattern is observed in a number of patients. In many cases, one leg can move in a relatively normal pattern, while the other leg is dysfunctional due to paralysis. We have adopted the so-called assist-as-needed control that encourages the patient to walk as much as possible while the robot assists as necessary to create the gait motion of the paralyzed leg. A virtual wall was implemented for the assist-as-needed control. A position based admittance controller was applied in the swing phase to follow human intentions for both the normal and paralyzed legs. A position controller was applied in the stance phase for both legs. A power controller was applied to obtain stable performance in that the output power of the system was delimited during the sample interval. In order to verify the proposed control algorithm, we performed a simulation with 1-DOF leg models. The preliminary results have shown that the control algorithm can follow human intentions during the swing phase by providing as much assistance as needed. In addition, the virtual wall effectively guided the paralyzed leg with stable force display.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.175-176
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• 2008

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2012.10a
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• pp.189-190
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• 2012

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2008.06a
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• pp.35-36
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• 2008