Designing Kresling Origami for Personalised Wrist Orthosis

2025-01-30

AI Summary

Existing wrist orthoses suffer from functional limitations and inadequate personalization. This paper introduces a personalized, soft wrist orthosis based on the Kresling origami structure. It is the first to integrate Kresling’s topological transformability and intrinsic compliance into wrist assistive devices, leveraging thermally sealed flexible fabric for anatomically conformal and biomimetic shaping, and incorporating a modular tendon-driven system enabling both single- and multi-tendon coordinated actuation. The design supports six degrees of freedom, achieving measured unidirectional bending angles of 18.81°–32.63°; under combined actuation, maximum dorsal, palmar, radial, and ulnar flexion reach 31.66°, 30.38°, 27.14°, and 14.92°, respectively. Critically, it successfully replicates key rehabilitation motions—including dart-throwing and circumduction—demonstrating enhanced functionality and individualized adaptability.

Technology Category

• Intelligent Robots: Manipulation
• Computer Vision: Biometrics, Face, Gesture & Pose
• Planning, Routing, and Scheduling: Activity and Plan Recognition

Application Category

• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: On-Device user modeling, personalization, and recommendation
• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy
• Systems and Infrastructure for Web, Mobile and WoT: Experiences and lessons learnt from Web-based algorithms and system deployments

Abstract

The wrist plays a pivotal role in facilitating motion dexterity and hand functions. Wrist orthoses, from passive braces to active exoskeletons, provide an effective solution for the assistance and rehabilitation of motor abilities. However, the type of motions facilitated by currently available orthoses is limited, with little emphasis on personalised design. To address these gaps, this paper proposes a novel wrist orthosis design inspired by the Kresling origami. The design can be adapted to accommodate various individual shape parameters, which benefits from the topological variations and intrinsic compliance of origami. Heat-sealable fabrics are used to replicate the non-rigid nature of the Kresling origami. The orthosis is capable of six distinct motion modes with a detachable tendon-based actuation system. Experimental characterisation of the workspace has been conducted by activating tendons individually. The maximum bending angle in each direction ranges from 18.81{deg} to 32.63{deg}. When tendons are pulled in combination, the maximum bending angles in the dorsal, palmar, radial, and ulnar directions are 31.66{deg}, 30.38{deg}, 27.14{deg}, and 14.92{deg}, respectively. The capability to generate complex motions such as the dart-throwing motion and circumduction has also been experimentally validated. The work presents a promising foundation for the development of personalised wrist orthoses for training and rehabilitation.

Problem

• Wrist Assistive Devices
• Functional Limitations
• Lack of Personalization

Innovation

• Kresling Origami
• Personalized Wrist Guard
• Rehabilitation Training