A Novel Soft Robotic Glove for Daily Life Assistance

Abstract

For assistive and rehabilitation purposes, this paper presents a novel soft robotic glove that supports the thumb in performing the abduction, adduction, flexion, and extension movements. In addition, using the combination of the abduction and flexion movements, the glove is able to assist the user in performing the thumb opposition motion. The feature of the proposed design is to combine two types of fiber-reinforced actuators, i.e. the rotary and the bending actuators. The rotary actuator facilitates the thumb abduction and adduction, and the bending actuator controls the finger flexion and extension. To quantify the actuators, the angle and the force output from both actuators are measured. Experimental results show that an angle of 90° and a force of 0.8 N could be obtained by the bending actuator at 150 kPa. On the other hand, an angle of 43° and a force of 0.8 N could be achieved by the rotary actuator at 50 kPa. Furthermore, these actuators were implemented onto a polyester glove and tested on a healthy subject. The results demonstrated that the soft robotic glove could produce the abduction and adduction movements of the thumb, as well as the flexion and extension movements of the fingers. This shows that the proposed soft robotic glove could provide a full range of motion to the fingers.