MRC-glove: A fMRI compatible soft robotic glove for hand rehabilitation application

Abstract

In this paper, we present the design, fabrication and preliminary evaluation of a soft robotic glove which can be used with functional Magnetic Resonance imaging (fMRI) during the hand continuous passive motion (CPM) in rehabilitation. The device comprises of two major components: a) soft pneumatic actuators and b) a glove. The soft pneumatic actuators, which are made of silicon elastomers, generate a bending motion and actuate the finger joints upon pressurization. As the device contains no ferromagnetic materials and operates pneumatically, we hypothesize that the device is MR-compatible. Our results show that the device did not cause artifacts to the fMRI images during CPM. This study demonstrated the possibility of using fMRI and MR-compatible soft robotic glove (MRC-Glove) to study motor performances of the brain during CPM rehabilitation and unravel the effects of rehabilitation robotics on brain stimulation.