CPG-based prostheses control

In this thesis we describe a strategy to control robotic knees and ankles. A dynamical system is used to generate a position trajectory to control a servo motor replacing the missing joint. The dynamical system consists in a pool of coupled oscillators modeling a central pattern generator (CPG). As a first step, anthropometric trajectories of the knee and ankle are learned by the system through the convergence of the oscillators to the specific frequencies, corresponding amplitudes and phase relations. The same system is then used to play back these trajectories. As a sensory feedback to trigger the playback we use one adaptive frequency oscillator to synchronized with the acceleration from the thigh. We use a bipedal model in a physics-based robot simulation environment to test the proposed system. Finally we present a simple hardware implementation of this system on the Agonist-Antagonist Active Knee prototype.