Motorized Gantry System

Abstract

In the United States alone, 2 million people are suffering from limb loss, with more than 150,000 amputations annually [1]. Prosthetics alleviate the risk of exclusion and dependence, with benefits in education, the job force, and the economy. With the increased demand for prosthetics, more research is needed to expand the knowledge and public use. The Neurobionics lab at the University of Michigan researches leg prosthetics that could benefit disabled individuals worldwide. In the lab, there is a manually operated gantry with a harness attached, which protects the prosthetics testee from falling during the test. The gantry system used at the University of Michigan Neurobionics lab can benefit from motorizing the gantry for promoting the ease of function and safety of the prosthetics testing environment. The current simple gantry system is inconvenient for researchers and does not protect the patients well' our task is to design a motorized gantry system that follows up the patient's movement automatically based on the testee's movement. The team will plan to create a scaled model of the system and eventually a scaled up prototype of the motorized gantry system.