Modular Design and Implementation of Upper Limb Exoskeleton Rehabilitation Robot: Structure, Force Sensor and Control

The existing upper limb rehabilitation robotic system has some limitations in the presence of diverse rehabilitation needs, such as patients with different anthropometric parameters, separate or combined rehabilitation of shoulder and elbow joints. To address these issues, modular design and implementation of upper-limb exoskeleton robot is presented in this paper. Firstly, modular exoskeleton mechanical structures and corresponding kinematic analyses of shoulder and elbow joints are developed; Secondly, mechanical structures, calibration and verification of force sensors for shoulder and elbow are implemented in a modular and distributed way; Finally, admittance controller is adopted to perform compliant interactions between the subjects and wearable exoskeleton robots. Experimental results demonstrate that the modular and distributed force sensors have high accuracy in measuring interactive force, and the modular shoulder and elbow rehabilitation robots can also achieve compliant interactions and meet the diversity needs of different patients.