Optimizing exoskeleton assistance to improve walking speed and energy economy for older adults.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Walking speed and energy economy tend to decline with age. Lower-limb exoskeletons have demonstrated potential to improve either measure, but primarily in studies conducted on healthy younger adults. Promising techniques like optimization of exoskeleton assistance have yet to be tested with older populations, while speed and energy consumption have yet to be simultaneously optimized for any population.

Methods

We investigated the effectiveness of human-in-the-loop optimization of ankle exoskeletons with older adults. Ten healthy adults > 65 years of age (5 females; mean age: 72 ± 3 yrs) participated in approximately 240 min of training and optimization with tethered ankle exoskeletons on a self-paced treadmill. Multi-objective human-in-the-loop optimization was us

SUBMITTER: Lakmazaheri A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10763092 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature