Identification of Human Control During Walking

This project focuses on a combination of experimental data and modeling to identify the control schemes humans use in gait during locomotion. We are particularly interested in mapping the identified controllers to powered prosthetic devices. We start by collecting typical gait data (kinematics and kinetics) of a person walking or running while being perturbed longitudinally and laterally with pseudo-random forces in a wide frequency spectrum. With the collected data we then make use of various optimization techniques and plant/controller structures to identify a controller employed by the subject. This controller is then used to inform the design of a controller for a powered prosthetic device which has different but similar sensors and actuators than the human.