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Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling

Since the first Cybathlon 2016, when twelve teams competed in the FES bike race, we have witnessed a global effort towards the development of stimulation and control strategies to improve FES-assisted devices, particularly for cycling, as a means to practice a recreational physical activity. As a re...

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Autores principales: Coelho-Magalhães, Tiago, Fachin-Martins, Emerson, Silva, Andressa, Azevedo Coste, Christine, Resende-Martins, Henrique
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8778229/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35062492
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s22020531
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author Coelho-Magalhães, Tiago
Fachin-Martins, Emerson
Silva, Andressa
Azevedo Coste, Christine
Resende-Martins, Henrique
author_facet Coelho-Magalhães, Tiago
Fachin-Martins, Emerson
Silva, Andressa
Azevedo Coste, Christine
Resende-Martins, Henrique
author_sort Coelho-Magalhães, Tiago
collection PubMed
description Since the first Cybathlon 2016, when twelve teams competed in the FES bike race, we have witnessed a global effort towards the development of stimulation and control strategies to improve FES-assisted devices, particularly for cycling, as a means to practice a recreational physical activity. As a result, a set of technical notes and research paved the way for many other studies and the potential behind FES-assisted cycling has been consolidated. However, engineering research needs instrumented devices to support novel developments and enable precise assessment. Therefore, some researchers struggle to develop their own FES-assisted devices or find it challenging to implement their instrumentation using commercial devices, which often limits the implementation of advanced control strategies and the possibility to connect different types of sensor. In this regard, we hypothesize that it would be advantageous for some researchers in our community to enjoy access to an entire open-source FES platform that allows different control strategies to be implemented, offers greater adaptability and power capacity than commercial devices, and can be used to assist different functional activities in addition to cycling. Hence, it appears to be of interest to make our proprietary electrical stimulation system an open-source device and to prove its capabilities by addressing all the aspects necessary to implement a FES cycling system. The high-power capacity stimulation device is based on a constant current topology that allows the creation of biphasic electrical pulses with amplitude, width, and frequency up to 150 mA, 1000 µs, and 100 Hz, respectively. A mobile application (Android) was developed to set and modify the stimulation parameters of up to eight stimulation channels. A proportional-integral controller was implemented for cadence tracking with the aim to improve the overall cycling performance. A volunteer with complete paraplegia participated in the functional testing of the system. He was able to cycle indoors for 45 min, accomplish distances of more than 5 km using a passive cycling trainer, and pedal 2400 m overground in 32 min. The results evidenced the capacity of our FES cycling system to be employed as a cycling tool for individuals with spinal cord injury. The methodological strategies used to improve FES efficiency suggest the possibility of maximizing pedaling duration through more advanced control techniques.
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spelling pubmed-87782292022-01-22 Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling Coelho-Magalhães, Tiago Fachin-Martins, Emerson Silva, Andressa Azevedo Coste, Christine Resende-Martins, Henrique Sensors (Basel) Article Since the first Cybathlon 2016, when twelve teams competed in the FES bike race, we have witnessed a global effort towards the development of stimulation and control strategies to improve FES-assisted devices, particularly for cycling, as a means to practice a recreational physical activity. As a result, a set of technical notes and research paved the way for many other studies and the potential behind FES-assisted cycling has been consolidated. However, engineering research needs instrumented devices to support novel developments and enable precise assessment. Therefore, some researchers struggle to develop their own FES-assisted devices or find it challenging to implement their instrumentation using commercial devices, which often limits the implementation of advanced control strategies and the possibility to connect different types of sensor. In this regard, we hypothesize that it would be advantageous for some researchers in our community to enjoy access to an entire open-source FES platform that allows different control strategies to be implemented, offers greater adaptability and power capacity than commercial devices, and can be used to assist different functional activities in addition to cycling. Hence, it appears to be of interest to make our proprietary electrical stimulation system an open-source device and to prove its capabilities by addressing all the aspects necessary to implement a FES cycling system. The high-power capacity stimulation device is based on a constant current topology that allows the creation of biphasic electrical pulses with amplitude, width, and frequency up to 150 mA, 1000 µs, and 100 Hz, respectively. A mobile application (Android) was developed to set and modify the stimulation parameters of up to eight stimulation channels. A proportional-integral controller was implemented for cadence tracking with the aim to improve the overall cycling performance. A volunteer with complete paraplegia participated in the functional testing of the system. He was able to cycle indoors for 45 min, accomplish distances of more than 5 km using a passive cycling trainer, and pedal 2400 m overground in 32 min. The results evidenced the capacity of our FES cycling system to be employed as a cycling tool for individuals with spinal cord injury. The methodological strategies used to improve FES efficiency suggest the possibility of maximizing pedaling duration through more advanced control techniques. MDPI 2022-01-11 /pmc/articles/PMC8778229/ /pubmed/35062492 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s22020531 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Coelho-Magalhães, Tiago
Fachin-Martins, Emerson
Silva, Andressa
Azevedo Coste, Christine
Resende-Martins, Henrique
Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling
title Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling
title_full Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling
title_fullStr Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling
title_full_unstemmed Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling
title_short Development of a High-Power Capacity Open Source Electrical Stimulation System to Enhance Research into FES-Assisted Devices: Validation of FES Cycling
title_sort development of a high-power capacity open source electrical stimulation system to enhance research into fes-assisted devices: validation of fes cycling
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8778229/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35062492
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/s22020531
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