ALICE Open Source pediatric Exoskeleton

Development of an Open system for robotic rehabilitation in economically-challenged communities

France
Created on 2020.05.21 720 views
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ABOUT
PROJECT TIMELINE
ALICE is arguably the first Child-Focused Open Source Lower-Limb Exoskeleton. It was designed in México in 2016 using an Educational SolidWorks License; she has since undergone constant updates and usage. Following her initial publication in Hackaday in 2017 and the launching of her Open Source Program on our website, ALICE has been replicated around Latin America and Europe; and teams are now getting registered from Asia. In 2019, successful clinical trials (journal publication in progress - Frontiers in Robotics and AI) pediatric patients were documented and are now pushing the design to increased international impact. The project has been developed with approximately $80,000.00 USD invested by both private and public partners in México, by a team of approximately 13 engineers and designers who have collaborated along the years and different stages, and with the help of private partners and individuals lending sponsorship and advice.    ALICE is available for use by anyone under the Attribution Non-Commercial CC License (CC BY-NC), and a basic model prototype can be constructed with a material budget of ~1,500 EUR. The team was awarded Solid Works Entrepreneurial Sponsorship in 2018, in México.   Summarized results from 2017 to 2019: 1 x Functional and clinically-tested accessible exoskeleton. 64 x Open Source Program participants in over 10 teams including Italy, France, México, United States, and China. 3 x Exoskeletons created by Open Source Program participants. 10 x Children with disability benefited from clinical use of ALICE Exoskeleton in México. 3 x Peer-Reviewed Publications for technology development. (2 conferences published + 1 journal in process) 2 x Intellectual Property Registrations in México and China for Industrial Design. 8+ x International Awards for Entrepreneurship, Social Impact and Research Impact.   Although this has been an effort of many people, my participation from Dec 2018 to Aug 2019 involved taking ALICE from TRL 6 to TRL 8, requiring personal work in: (1) patient-focused mechanical design upgrades (performed on Solid Works 2019 Professional, (2) clinical implementation and operation with patients, (3) code and design documentation for Open Source sharing, and (4) documentation for peer-review publications.   People involved: Fernanda Zapata-Murrieta (Bachelor Student) fzapata.indi@gmail.com  Fernando Martínez-García (PhD Student) fgarcia.indi@gmail.com  Ulises Tamez-Duque (Medical Advisor) utamez.indi@gmail.com  Rogelio Soto (Professor and Scientific Supervisor) rsoto@tec.mx  Jesús Tamez-Duque (Original Developer) jtamez.indi@gmail.com  
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PC Paoline Coulson
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Project Timeline
Project Timeline