A semianalytic approach to the modelling and control of the biped gait for the design of interactive orthoses in rehabilitation tasks

The configuration space of humanoid robots is usually modelled in terms of rotational joints. Passive devices allow maintenance of an upright standing posture with minimal energy expenditure. Our goal is to improve the control of biped gait by integrating in an extended geometric support precedent approach to the subject. The functional coupling between anticipatory and compensatory human locomotion behaviour is modelled as an alternance between forward and inverse mechanics around periodically changing optimal values. This alternance is translated to a coupling between active and passive mechanical robotic devices. So, our approach provides a general theoretical framework to integrate active and passive orthoses based on reciprocal mechanical devices for rehabilitation tasks.