Chapter 6: SOFT ROBOTIC GLOVE FOR COMBINED ASSISTANCE AND REHABILITATION DURING ACTIVITIES OF DAILY LIVING

The human hand plays an important role in the manipulation and exploration of the environment. Unfortunately, when disease or injury impedes hand function, the consequences are numerous including disrupting quality of life, independence, and financial stability. In this chapter, we present the development of a soft robotic glove designed to support basic hand function. The glove uses soft fluidic actuators programmed to apply assistive forces to support the range of motion of a human hand. More specifically, we present a method of fabrication and characterization of these soft actuators as well as consider an approach for controlling the glove. This analysis concludes with results from preliminary human subjects testing where glove performance was evaluated on a healthy and an impaired subject.