The 2021 IEEE International Conference on Real-time Computing and Robotics (IEEE RCAR 2021) took place from July 15 to 19, 2021 in the beautiful city of Xining, Qinghai, China. Dr. Mingming Zhang, from Southern University of Science and Technology, gave a Keynote Talk with the topic as Task-oriented rehabilitation techniques with robot-assisted information feedback. The details of the talk was as follows.
Abstract: Individuals with physical disabilities are often restricted to perform activities of daily life (ADLs). While efficacy of bilateral training has been demonstrated in improving physical coordination of human limbs, few robots have been developed in simulating people’s ADLs integrated with task-specific force field control. This study sought to develop a bilateral robot for better task rendering of general ADLs (gADLs), where gADL-consistent workspace is achieved by setting linear motors in series, and haptic rendering of multiple bimanual tasks (coupled, uncoupled and semi-coupled) is enabled by regulating force fields between robotic handles. Experiments were conducted with human users, and our results present a viable method of a single robotic system in simulating multiple physically bimanual tasks. The proposed robotic system is expected to be serving as a coordination training device, and its clinical efficacy will be also investigated. In this task, other relevant robot-assisted rehabilitation techniques will also be briefly introduced.
Biography: Mingming Zhang, IEEE Senior Member, Principal Investigator of Brain-Robot Rehabilitation Technology Lab, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Southern University of Science and Technology (Shenzhen, China). His main research interests include tactile sensing and feedback technology, intelligent control and human-computer interaction, wearable exoskeleton rehabilitation robots, and EMG/EEG based pattern recognition algorithms. He received the Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Auckland, New Zealand, in 2015. From 2015 to 2016, he worked as a postdoc research fellow in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Auckland. From early 2017 to 2018, he worked at CASTIOT LIMITED (Auckland) as a vice president in developing lower limb rehabilitation robotics. He was also employed as a visiting research fellow at the University of Auckland. He has authored over 50 academic papers published on peer-reviewed international journals in the fields of robotics, intelligent control, neural rehabilitation, and biomechanics, including IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation, Journal of Biomechanics, etc. Over 30 patents have been applied or authorized as well. He also authored an academic book published by Institution of Engineering and Technology.
