Wearable Robotics: A Bibliographic Survey on Actuators, Actuation, and Control Systems With Applications

Block Diagram Of Wearable Robotics

Figure 1 shows the general block diagram of wearable robots. Control unit receives the data acquired by sensors installed on human body and human-machine interface. With respect to data received by control unit, it sends the power signals to actuators to generate necessary output required for human body through mechanical assembly. The control unit may be microprocessor or microcontroller or an embedded system.

Figure 1.

General block diagram of wearable robot

Actuators with mechanical assembly may be placed/installed as- (a) a body part that is at joint levels so that no transmission element is required. (b) distally placed through a transmission element. In exoskeletal robotics, hydraulic, pneumatic, and electric are the commonly used actuators. Commonly used actuators are DC motors, DC servomotors, elastic fluidic actuator, piston–cylinder fluidic actuators, and drag-based fluidic actuators, dielectric elastomer actuator (DEA), piezoelectric actuator, Electromagnetic actuators, carbon nanotube-based actuators. Soft actuators are becoming popular in wearable robots. The actuation assembly/mechanism used is gear drives, cable links, link mechanism. The actuated power is provided to body part or muscle, upper or lower limb for rehabilitation.