The first prosthesis that feels like a normal hand has been tested by researchers
The technology of hand prostheses has evolved a lot, and they have become more and more sophisticated. The next step was to replicate the natural sensations.
Ordinary prostheses recreate the complex shape and details of the joints and fingers, while other prostheses allow you to move as you wish. However, a study published in Science Translational Medicine offers a new technology: artificial arms that feel like a real hand when you use them.
The researchers recruited people who had amputations and underwent operations to reconfigure certain muscle and sensory nerves surrounding the amputated limbs. They allow them to control their prosthesis through signals that the brain sends to the nerves.
On three of these patients, the researchers attached devices that generate vibrations that are transmitted to the muscles in the vicinity of the amputated area. When the new type of prosthesis was started, these vibrations created a kind of kinesthesia - an awareness of one's own movement - from the prosthetic hand, as the person performed tasks with it. Volunteers had amputations below the elbow or even the entire arm amputated.
The experiment allowed them to feel when they moved their hand, but most of all, it gave them that intuition to move without constantly looking at their arm. Thus, together with sight, it gave them better control over the prosthesis.
Paul Marasco, a biomedical engineer, said that naturally, we prepare ourselves mentally before we use our limbs. He claims that he and his colleagues have been able to give the people they have worked with the feeling that they can move their hand to something without looking at that object and generally do these things as if they were not. never had his arm amputated.
"Scientists have known since the 1970s that muscle vibration can give this illusion," he said. The researchers were amazed that they were able to find these synergies that give you the feeling that your whole hand is moving.
Currently, 10% of people with upper limb amputations end up rejecting prostheses because they do not feel comfortable or do not see the point.
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