Program Overview

Institute for Sensing and Embedded Network Systems Engineering (I-SENSE)

The Institute for Sensing and Embedded Network Systems Engineering (I-SENSE) was established in early 2015 to coordinate university-wide activities in the Sensing and Smart Systems pillar of Florida Atlantic University's Strategic Plan for the Race to Excellence.

Programs

Programs Overview

I-SENSE offers various programs, including:

• Infrastructure Systems
• Marine and Environment
• Health and Behavior
• Undergraduate Research Opportunity

Health and Behavior: Prosthetic Hand Design and Control

Project Description

This REU project is focused on the design of robotic prosthetics. The REU participant will learn effective practices in measuring all of the hand joint angles of human test subjects during common tasks of daily life, such as opening doors and pouring liquid.

Project Details

The participant will:

• Measure hand motions using the CyberGlove available in FAU's BioRobotic's Laboratory
• Perform a principal component analysis on the corresponding hand joint angle data to assess the impact that each joint contributes to the overall motion during the tasks
• Eliminate joints with negligible impact on overall motion and fit functions of time to the most impactful joints
• Ensure that the functions will be smoothly differentiable and appropriate for robotic motion planning
• Accommodate any joint space discrepancies between the human hand and the 20-degree of freedom Dexterous Shadow Hand in FAU's BioRobotics laboratory
• Program the human-inspired joint angle trajectories using the Robot Operating System (ROS)
• Perform comparable robotic hand experiments using the newly defined robotic motion plans and quantify the efficacy of the joint angle mapping methodology

Project Leader

The project is led by Erik Engeberg, Ph.D., an Associate Professor at the Ocean and Mechanical Engineering Department, Florida Atlantic University. His research interests include bioinspired control, robotics, energy harvesting, electrophysiology, and compliant sensors.

Research Background

Dr. Engeberg has served as the Associate Editor of the 2014 and 2016 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA) and received the Outstanding Paper Award at the 2012 International Conference on Control and Automation Systems. He has delivered numerous invited presentations, including the 2015 IEEE ICRA Robotic Hand Grasping and Manipulation Workshop.

Undergraduate Research Opportunity (REU)

The REU program provides a meaningful experience for participants while contributing to ongoing research projects, including the Prosthetic Hand Design and Control project.