World's first bionic legs presented

(ANSA) - Rome, March 16 - Scientists in Florence on Monday presented the world's first set of bionic legs aimed at enabling amputees to walk with less effort. The legs are the result of a European project called Cyberlegs that combines artificial limbs with so-called wearable robots. Up to now 11 people have tested the bionic legs at Florence's Fondazione Don Gnocchi as part of the project coordinated by the Bio-Robotics Institute of Pisa's Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna University. "It's a combination of technologies that help people walk in a natural way again," said Nicola Vitiello, the project's coordinator.
    The Cyberlegs, standing for CYBERnetic Lower-Limb Cognitive Ortho-prosthesis, enable the amputee to walk backwards and forward, go up and down stairs, and move from sit-to-stand and stand-to-sit with a minimum cognitive and energetic effort.
    The legs can 'understand' user-motor intentions smoothly and effectively to prevent the risk of falling, via a multi-sensory fusion algorithm based on observation of the motion of the amputee's body, the interaction force between the Cyberlegs and the amputee, and their force interaction with ground.
    Vitiello said that, if the project gets adequate funding from industrial partners, the Cyberlegs should be on the market "within two or three years". "The results (of tests) suggest more engineering work is needed on the system to reduce volume and weight to improve the comfort for the amputee," he added.
    The bionic legs were developed with experts from he University of Ljubljana in Slovenia, the Catholic University of Louvain and the Free University of Brussels, both Belgian institutions. The project was founded in 2012 thanks to 2.5 million euros in European Commission funding by Maria Chiara Carrozza, who was also in charge of it until she was sworn in as education minister in 2013. "The number of amputees is increasing and it's a great success for them to be able to leave behind their crutches and wheelchairs," said Carrozza, who was education minister until February 2014. The Cyberlegs system is based on a several different elements developed by the project.
    These include a robotic prosthesis connected to a network of sensors that replaces the amputated limb and an robotic active pelvis orthosis, which being linked to both limbs, supports the motion and facilitates walking.