Design and Simulation Analysis of a Robot-Assisted Gait Trainer with the PBWS System

Abstract

In response to the ever-increasing demand of lower limb rehabilitation, this paper presents a novel robot-assisted gait trainer (RGT) to assist the elderly and the pediatric patients with neurological impairments in the lower limb rehabilitation training (LLRT). The RGT provides three active degrees of freedom (DoF) to both legs that are used to implement the gait cycle in such a way that the natural gait is not significantly affected. The robot consists of (i) the partial body weight support (PBWS) system to assist patients in sit-to-stand transfer via the precision linear rail system and (ii) the bipedal end-effector (BE) to control the motions of lower limbs via two mechanical arms. The robot stands out for multiple modes of training and optimized functional design to improve the quality of life for those patients. To analyze the performance of the RGT, the kinematic and static models are established in this paper. After that, the reachable workspace and motion trajectory are analyzed to cover the motion requirements and implement natural gait cycle. The preliminary results demonstrate the usability of the robot.