Control Design Inspired by Motors Primitives to Coordinate the Functioning of an Active Knee Orthosis for Robotic Rehabilitation

In order to assist physiotherapists during the process of rehabilitation of individuals, especially after anomalies in the neuromusculoskeletal system due to diseases such as stroke or injuries, different types of orthoses for lower limbs and controls for these orthoses have been developed. This work aims to develop a robotic control strategy based on kinetic motor primitives, capable of assisting the recovery of patients with compromised movements. The primitives are calculated from the torques obtained by OpenSim’s Inverse Dynamics, which are used as input into the scaled model of the subject that used the orthosis along with the positions provided by the encoders of the orthosis fixed to the knee joint of the subject, who performed the extension/flexion movement. The proposed strategy was evaluated using a Forward Dynamics algorithm, through which new knee position data were obtained.