Wearable Torque Control for Walking-in-Place Exercise Detection
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing walking assistance devices struggle to accurately determine when a user is performing a walking-in-place exercise and provide appropriate external forces, leading to potential inconvenience during rehabilitation or exercise.
Innovation Solution
A wearable device equipped with a driving module, angle sensors, and processors that analyze joint angles to determine if a user is performing a walking-in-place exercise, and provides tailored external forces through torque control based on joint angle differences.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If the wearable device provides external force during walking-in-place exercise, then exercise effectiveness is improved, but the device may provide inappropriate force if exercise detection is inaccurate, causing user inconvenience
Solution Approach 1:
The system continuously monitors joint angles through angle sensors and uses this feedback to dynamically adjust the external force provided by the driving module. The processor compares real-time joint angle data with reference values to detect walking-in-place exercise and modulates torque accordingly, ensuring force is provided only when appropriate exercise is detected.
Solution Approach 2:
The system changes the parameter of external force (torque) based on detected exercise state. When walking-in-place exercise is detected through joint angle analysis, the driving module adjusts its output torque to provide appropriate assistance or resistance, thereby improving exercise effectiveness while avoiding inappropriate force application.
2Measurement precision
If the device uses multiple angle values and complex analysis to determine exercise type, then detection accuracy is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system segments the exercise detection process into distinct phases: obtaining joint angle values from sensors, determining specific angle values at key moments (cross timepoint, contact timepoint, take-off timepoint), comparing with reference values, and making exercise type determination. This segmentation allows complex detection to be managed through structured, modular processing steps.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary actions by pre-establishing reference joint angle values for different exercise types and pre-defining the sequence of analysis steps. This allows the processor to efficiently compare real-time measurements against predetermined criteria, reducing the computational complexity of real-time decision-making while maintaining high detection accuracy.
Data Source
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Figure 1B
Figure 2A
AI summary
This wearable device may comprise: a driving module that provides an external force to a user; an angle sensor that obtains angle values by measuring angles of the user's joints; and at least one processor. The at least one processor may: individually and/or collectively receive the angle values from the angle sensor; determine at least one angle value from among the received angle values; determine whether the user is exercising by walking in place on the basis of at least one of the determined at least one angle value or a walking index value of the user; and control the driving module to provide the user with an external force suitable for the walking in-place exercise when it is determined that the user is exercising by walking in place.