With the increasing preva‎lence of incidents and diseases leading to motor impairments, there is a growing need for advanced rehabilitation technologies to improve the quality of life for patients with mobility issues. If an individual is unable to perform a gait correctly, rehabilitation exercises and external assistance can gradually help correct the movement. This research proposes and simulates a lower-limb end-effector type robotic rehabilitation system designed to correct walking gait, such as walking on a flat surface. This study consists of two main parts: simulating the rehabilitation robot and its interaction with the user, and simulating the walking gait of both able-bodied and impaired users on the rehabilitation robot. The proposed robotic system features two pedals with three degrees of freedom that move in a sagittal plane. The user, supported by a weight-support mechanism, such as a harness, stands on these pedals, allowing coordinated movement between the feet and pedals. The robot continuously monitors the user's foot movement on the pedals using a proposed interactive control law. If additional support is needed, the robot applies external forces through the pedals to ensure correct movement execution. The user’s movement is simulated using a three-link, three-joint mechanical model for direct kinematics from the hip to the pedals. Additionally, the walking gait is obtained from biomechanical data of healthy individuals to generate the reference trajectory for pedal movement. The interactive control law utilizes a virtual channel around the reference path with an adjustable radius. If the user’s foot movement remains within this channel and close enough to the reference trajectory, the pedals follow the foot’s movement. As deviations from the reference path increase, the robot provides necessary support to guide the foot towards the optimal path. If the deviation exceeds twice the virtual channel’s radius, the pedals control the foot’s movement directly, guiding it back to the reference path. The proposed system's performance was eva‎luated under different conditions of able-bodied, semi-able, and disabled users and the results demonstrate the system's effectiveness and accuracy in providing assistance as needed.

حامد جلالي بيدگلي

جعفر قيصري , احسان روحاني