skip to main content
US FlagAn official website of the United States government
dot gov icon
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
https lock icon
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( lock ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Explore Research Products in the PAR
It may take a few hours for recently added research products to appear in PAR search results.


Title: The Smart Cane Project: Integrating Screen Interfaces and Physiological Sensors into Mobility Devices
Integrating sensors and screen interfaces directly into mobility devices offers individuals living with mobility issues, and medical providers, the opportunity to monitor health data and offer patient-specific therapeutic feedback in real time. This paper presents a series of prototypes that were developed in order to assess how these features can be optimally integrated into common mobility devices such as the walking cane. The early prototypes explored strategies for mounting a smartphone to a cane, as a low-cost strategy for improving mobility and reducing isolation by making use of smartphone apps for wayfinding, gait tracking, and video-conferencing. The later prototypes focused on the non-invasive integration of physiological sensors, in particular a pulse oximeter, to provide instantaneous physiological data to both the user and healthcare providers. Through a process of prototyping and critique, and integrating feedback from users, we developed an iterative series of designs that explore new strategies for affordable and easily accessible assistive technology. We conclude with a discussion of how these design strategies might be further developed and combined in order to provide more opportunities for seniors living with mobility issues to age in place.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2124312
PAR ID:
10481916
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Publisher / Repository:
AHFE Open Access Proceedings Human
Date Published:
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. (, International Symposium on Wearable Computers Design Exhibition)
    null (Ed.)
    Upper limb mobility impairments affect individuals at all life stages. Exoskeletons can assist in rehabilitation as well as performing Activities of Daily Living (ADL). Most commercial assistive devices still rely on rigid robotics with constrained biomechanical degrees of freedom that may even increase user exertion. Therefore, this paper discusses the iterative design and development of a novel hybrid pneumatic actuation and Shape Memory Alloy (SMA) based wearable soft exoskeleton to assist in shoulder abduction and horizontal flexion/extension movements, with integrated soft strain sensing to track shoulder joint motion. The garment development was done in two stages which involved creating (1) SMA actuators integrated with soft sensing, and (2) integrating pneumatic actuation. The final soft exoskeleton design was developed based on the insights gained from two prior prototypes in terms of wearability, usability, comfort, and functional specifications (i.e., placement and number) of the sensors and actuators. The final exoskeleton is a modular, multilayer garment which uses a hybrid and customizable actuation strategy (SMA and inflatable pneumatic bladder). 
    more » « less
  2. ; ; (, CHI EA '23: Extended Abstracts of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems)
    Proficiency in Orientation and Mobility (O&M) is vital for people who are blind or visually impaired (BVI) to access physical environments and economic opportunities. While much engineering effort has focused on using technology to augment the practice of using a mobility cane, there is comparatively little work on using technology in service of teaching the use of the cane itself. We report a case study of a multi-year collaboration between assistive technology researchers and a certified O&M instructor at Perkins School for the Blind to utilize technology to create O&M teaching tools that use the concept of gamification to make such training more fun and effective. In this collaboration we adopted an action research approach, and through the application of action research HCI methods created several prototype systems for teaching O&M skills. These prototypes were refined to create the Cane Game: a system for teaching students cane sweeping technique using interactive music and sound. The Cane Game system can be constructed for less than $100 and is capable of being distributed at large-scale. A qualitative study of Perkins students' O&M educational trajectories while using the system illuminates the conditions in which this tool is effective as a teaching aid. 
    more » « less
  3. ; ; ; ; ; ; ; (, Disability and Rehabilitation: Assistive Technology)
    Wheelchair users (WCUs) face additional challenges than non-WCU to multi-tasking (i.e. open doors, cook, use a cell-phone) while navigating their environments. While assistive devices have attempted to provide WCUs with mobility solutions that enable multi-tasking capabilities, current devices have been developed without the input of end-users and have proven to be non-usable. More balanced approaches that integrate the end-users’ voices may improve current assistive technology usability trends. This study sought to empathically understand the lived experience of WCUs, their needs towards a mobility device, and their perceptions towards hands-free mobility. Full-time WCUs and care providers participated in semi-structured interviews examining wheelchair use and perceptions towards current and future mobility devices. Thematic analysis was used to analyze interview data. 9 WCUs (aged 32.1 ± 7.0 years; wheelchair experience 17.9 ± 11.6 years) and five care providers (years caring for WCU 3.75 ± 0.96 years) participated in the study. The most common disability type was spinal cord injury (WCUs: n = 3; care providers: n = 3). Qualitative analysis revealed four key themes: (1) Current wheelchair usage, (2) WCU and care provider perspectives, (3) Future wheelchair, and (4) Hands-free wheelchair. Accordingly, participants desire bespoke, light-weight mobility devices that can through tight spaces, access uneven terrain, and free the hands during navigation. This study provides meaningful insight into the needs of WCUs and care providers that assistive technology innovators can use to develop more usable assistive technologies. Amongst study participants, the concept of a hands-free mobility device appears to be usable and desirable. 
    more » « less
  4. (, Proceedings of the IEEERSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems)
    Persons with disabilities often rely on caregivers or family members to assist in their daily living activities. Robotic assistants can provide an alternative solution if intuitive user interfaces are designed for simple operations. Current humanrobot interfaces are still far from being able to operate in an intuitive way when used for complex activities of daily living (ADL). In this era of smartphones that are packed with sensors, such as accelerometers, gyroscopes and a precise touch screen, robot controls can be interfaced with smartphones to capture the user’s intended operation of the robot assistant. In this paper, we review the current popular human-robot interfaces, and we present three novel human-robot smartphone-based interfaces to operate a robotic arm for assisting persons with disabilities in their ADL tasks. Useful smartphone data, including 3 dimensional orientation and 2 dimensional touchscreen positions, are used as control variables to the robot motion in Cartesian teleoperation. In this paper, we present the three control interfaces, their implementation on a smartphone to control a robotic arm, and a comparison between the results on using the three interfaces for three different ADL tasks. The developed interfaces provide intuitiveness, low cost, and environmental adaptability. 
    more » « less
  5. ; ; (, International Conference on Distributed Computing in Sensor Systems and workshops)
    Stress increases the risk of several mental and physical health problems like anxiety, hypertension, and cardiovascular diseases. Better guidance and interventions towards mitigating the impact of stress can be provided if stress can be monitored continuously. The recent proliferation of wearable devices and their capability in measuring several physiological signals related to stress have created the opportunity to measure stress continuously in the wild. Wearable devices used to measure physiological signals are mostly placed on the wrist and the chest. Though currently chest sensors, with/without wrist sensors, provide better results in detecting stress than using wrist sensors only, chest devices are not as convenient and prevalent as wrist devices, particularly in the free-living context. In this paper, we present a solution to detect stress using wrist sensors that emulate the gold standard chest sensors. Data from wrist sensors are translated into the data from chest sensors, and the translated data is used for stress detection without requiring the users to wear any device on the chest. We evaluated our solution using a public dataset, and results show that our solution detects stress with accuracy comparable to the gold standard chest devices which are impractical for daily use 
    more » « less
  • Citation Formats
  • MLA
  • APA
  • Chicago
  • BibTeX
  • Save / Share this Record
  • Send to Email