It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Palestinians launch national football team for amputees Palestinian players with disabilities, part of a football team organised by the International Committee of the Red Cross, take part in a training session in Gaza City (AFP/MOHAMMED ABED) Sakher ABOU EL OUN Thu, December 2, 2021
Players in the Gaza Strip used crutches and prosthetic legs Thursday to stretch, run and dribble as part of the first-ever Palestinian national team that hopes to qualify for the Amputee Football World Cup.
The team trained at the Palestine Stadium in Gaza City under the supervision of the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The 20 players on the team were selected from among five Gaza clubs for players who lost limbs.
Player Hassan Abu Kareem, 38, said his leg was amputated after he was injured in an Israeli raid on Al-Maghazi refugee camp in 2006.
"From the moment of injury, my life has not changed," he told AFP.
"I continued with my ambition and great goal in life, and my goal is to represent Palestine and to make an achievement for myself in the field of sports."
Red Cross spokeswoman Suhair Zakkout said the players were setting a new Palestinian standard after the first local team began in 2019 with several players.
"Today, these players make history by forming the first national football team for amputees," she said.
Zakkout said the players were training for qualifying matches to be held in March 2022 in Iran. If the team succeeds, they will go on to the Amputee Football World Cup, slated to be held in Turkey in late 2022.
Fuad Abu Ghaliun, chairman of the Palestine Amputee Football Association, said his group applied to join the World Amputee Football Federation in 2019. Their candidacy was accepted earlier this year.
The Palestinian team is in the isolated Gaza Strip, whose two million residents have been locked under an Israeli blockade since the Islamist Hamas movement took control in 2007
Friday is the International Day of Persons with Disabilities.
Coach Simon Baker, himself an amputee, said he was working with players "in a way where people see the football being played, and not the person with a disability."
"We want people to respect the players and see them for Ahmed or whoever it is and not see them as somebody broken. We want to make heroes of these players," said Baker, who founded the Irish Amputee Football Association.
The Palestinian team is in the isolated Gaza Strip, whose two million residents have been locked under an Israeli blockade since the Islamist movement Hamas took control in 2007.
Ahmed Abu Nar, 34, used crutches and said he was injured in 2018 by Israeli forces who suppressed Gaza protests known as the "Great March of Return".
"Before the injury I was one person, and after the injury I became someone else," he told AFP. "A new life began, new goals began and new ambitions and new challenges, and now I am achieving my goals."
VIDEO: INTERVIEW WITH RESEARCHERS, AMPUTEEview more
CREDIT: PART I : FOR THE FIRST 2:57 MINUTES, CC-BY-SA , CREDIT: EPFL. PART II: FROM 2:57 - 4:00, COPYRIGHT: CENTRO PROTESI INAIL
“When I touch the stump with my hand, I feel tingling in my missing hand, my phantom hand. But feeling the temperature variation is a different thing, something important... something beautiful,” says Francesca Rossi.
Rossi is an amputee from Bologna, Italy. She recently participated in a study to test the effects of temperature feedback directly to the skin on her residual arm. She is one of 17 patients to have felt her phantom, missing hand, change in temperature thanks to new EPFL technology. More importantly, she reports feeling reconnected to her missing hand.
“Temperature feedback is a nice sensation because you feel the limb, the phantom limb, entirely. It does not feel phantom anymore because your limb is back,” Rossi continues.
Researchers Silvestro Micera and Solaiman Shokur have been keen on incorporating new sensory feedback into prosthetic limbs for providing more realistic touch to amputees, and their latest study focuses on temperature. They stumbled upon a discovery about temperature feedback that far exceeds their expectations.
If you place something hot or cold on the forearm of an intact individual, that person will feel the object’s temperature locally, directly on their forearm. But in amputees, that temperature sensation on the residual arm may be felt… in the phantom, missing hand.
By providing temperature feedback non-invasively, via thermal electrodes (aka thermodes) placed against the skin on the residual arm, amputees like Rossi report feeling temperature in their phantom limb. They can feel if an object is hot or cold, and can tell if they are touching copper, plastic or glass. In a collaboration between EPFL, Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies (SSSA) and Centro Protesi Inail, the technology was successfully tested in 17 out of 27 patients. The results are published in Science.
“Of particular importance is that phantom thermal sensations are perceived by the patient as similar to the thermal sensations experienced by their intact hand," explains Shokur, EPFL senior scientist neuroengineer who co-led the study.
Towards realistic bionic touch
The projection of temperature sensations into the phantom limb has led to the development of new bionic technology, one that equips prosthetics with non-invasive temperature feedback that allows amputees to discern what they’re touching.
“Temperature feedback is essential for relaying information that goes beyond touch, it leads to feelings of affection. We are social beings and warmth is an important part of that,” says Micera, Bertarelli Foundation Chair in Translational Neuroengineering, professor at EPFL and SSSA who also co-led the study. “For the first time, after many years of research in my laboratory showing that touch and position information can be successfully delivered, we envisage the possibility of restoring all of the rich sensations that one’s natural hand can provide.”
Temperature feedback, from well-being to prosthetics
Metaphysiks has been developing neuro-haptic technology, MetaTouch, which connects the body with digital worlds. MetaTouch combines touch and temperature feedback to augment physical products for well-being.
“This breakthrough highlights the power of haptics to improve medical conditions and enhance the quality of life for people with disabilities,” says Simon Gallo, Co-founder and Head of Technology at Metaphysiks.
The EPFL neuroengineers borrowed MetaTouch that provides thermal feedback directly to a user’s skin. With this device, they discovered the thermal phantom sensations and subsequently tested it in 27 amputees.
The Minitouch prototype and tests
For the study, Shokur and Micera developed the MiniTouch, a device that provides thermal feedback and specifically built for integration into wearable devices like prosthetics. The MiniTouch consists of a thin, wearable sensor that can be placed over an amputee’s prosthetic finger. The finger sensor detects thermal information about the object being touched, more specifically, the object’s heat conductivity. If the object is metallic, it will naturally conduct more heat or cold than, for instance, a plastic one. A thermode, one that is in contact with the skin on the amputee’s residual arm, heats up or cools down, relaying the temperature profile of the object being touched by the finger sensor.
“When we presented the possibility to get back temperature sensation on the phantom limb or the possibility to feel the contact with different materials, we obtained a lot of positive feedback. And eventually, we were able to recruit more than 25 volunteers in less than two years,” says Federico Morosato who was responsible for organizing the clinical aspect of the trials at Centro Protesi Inail.
The scientists found that small areas of skin on the residual arm project to specific parts of the phantom hand, like the thumb, or the tip of an index finger. As expected, they discovered that the mapping of temperature sensations between the residual arm and the entire projected phantom one is unique to each patient.
Bionic prosthetics for repairing the human body
Almost a decade ago, Micera and colleagues provided real-time sensory feedback about objects being grasped. They went on to improve touch resolution by providing feedback about an object’s texture and position information in a reliable way. Moreover, they discovered that amputees begin to embody their prosthetic hand if provided with sensory feedback directly into their intact nervous system. The added sensation of temperature feedback is yet another step towards building bionic prosthetics for repairing the human body. Fine-tuning temperature sensations and integrating these into a wearable device that can be mapped out to each patient are part of the next steps.
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY
IMAGE: JOHNNY MATHENY, A PROSTHETICS TESTER, DETERMINES WHICH COLA CAN IS THE COLDEST USING A MODULAR PROSTHETIC LIMB AND THIN-FILM THERMOELECTRIC DEVICE, BOTH DEVELOPED BY THE JOHNS HOPKINS APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY.view more
CREDIT: ED WHITMAN / JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY APPLIED PHYSICS LABORATORY
Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) researchers have developed one of the world’s smallest, most intense and fastest refrigeration devices, the wearable thin-film thermoelectric cooler (TFTEC), and teamed with neuroscientists to help amputees perceive a sense of temperature with their phantom limbs. This advancement, one of the first of its kind, enables a useful new capability for a variety of applications, including improved prostheses, haptics for new modalities in augmented reality (AR) and thermally-modulated therapeutics for applications such as pain management. The technology also has a variety of potential industrial and research applications, such as cooling electronics and lasers and energy harvesting in satellites.
TFTEC development at APL started in 2016, when Rama Venkatasubramanian, a semiconductor device engineer and chief technologist for APL’s thermoelectrics research, began developing advanced nano-engineered thermoelectric materials and devices for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) MATRIX program. To support MATRIX, APL developed advanced thin-film thermoelectric materials called Controlled Hierarchically Engineered Superlattice Structures (CHESS), to enable an entirely new set of transduction capabilities for several Department of Defense applications, including cooling computer chips and engine components.
Venkatasubramanian’s strides in CHESS thermoelectrics were so significant by the end of 2019 that Bobby Armiger, who supervises APL’s Exploratory Science Branch, wondered if his devices could be used to facilitate temperature sensation in phantom limbs of amputees for improved prostheses. Since 2006, APL had been leading DARPA’s Revolutionizing Prosthetics program, an effort focused on creating a mentally controlled artificial limb that will restore near-natural motor and sensory capability to upper-extremity amputee patients.
“We’ve known that we can stimulate specific parts of someone’s amputated limb to feel sensations of touch and vibration, but no one has been able to create a cooling sensation with the speed, intensity, and efficiency to restore natural thermal perception with a prosthetic system,” Armiger said. “Restoring temperature sensation has practical applications — like identifying a cold beverage — as well as having the potential to improve the emotional embodiment of the prosthetic device, perhaps by feeling the warmth of a loved one’s hand.”
Venkatasubramanian and the thermoelectrics team began collaborating with Armiger and a team of neuroscientists and roboticists as part of a study supported by the Center for Rehabilitation Sciences Research within the Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation (PM&R) at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USU), through a subaward from The Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine to create a wearable thermoelectric cooler fast and intense enough to match the human body’s ability to rapidly sense temperature changes.
From that, the wearable TFTEC was created.
“Our TFTEC is just a little more than one millimeter thick, weighs only 0.05 grams, similar to a thin adhesive bandage, and can provide intense cooling in less than a second,” said Venkatasubramanian. “It’s also two times more energy efficient than today’s most common thermoelectric devices, and can be readily manufactured using semiconductor tools that are also used for manufacturing light-emitting diodes [LEDs]. It’s an exciting development that could have huge implications for prostheses and haptics applications.”
To test the TFTEC’s efficacy, researchers mapped thermal sensations in the phantom hands of four amputees.
“When someone loses part of a limb, the nerves within the residual limb are still there, which can lead to the ‘phantom’ limb sensation,” said Luke Osborn, a neuroengineering researcher who leads much of APL’s noninvasive nerve simulation work. “You can place electrodes on different parts of an amputee’s upper arm where those nerves have regrown and stimulate sensation — typically pressure, but in the current case, temperature —and the individual can tell us where in their phantom hand they feel those sensations.”
Nature Biomedical Engineering recently published results from APL’s extensive TFTEC research for such sensory applications, which included lab-scale characterization, trials with amputees and a real-life demonstration of the approach. The study notes that the TFTEC elicited cooling sensations in the phantom limbs of all participants during a cold detection task, whereas traditional thermoelectric technology only did so in half of them — and the TFTEC did so eight times faster and with three times the intensity. Additionally, TFTEC used half the energy compared to current thermoelectric devices.
“We found that the TFTEC device was significantly better at creating faster and more intense cooling sensations compared to traditional devices, even though the target temperature was the same,” said Osborn. “And that helped participants make faster decisions and observations.”
The stimulation sites on test participants remained the same over 48 weeks of testing, suggesting that the technology could enable users to feel temperature in their missing hands for years. This temporal stability along with a wearable noninvasive procedure are attractive for adoption to real-world use.
“When we started our work in March 2020, we realized that within just a couple of trials we could stimulate the phantom limbs of an amputee,” said Venkatasubramanian. “We heard participants say, ‘Yes, I felt an immediate cold feeling here and a tingle there.’”
The APL team continued to perfect its approach through testing on several individuals with amputation along with those with an intact limb. “These are the developments we dream of as scientists,” Venkatasubramanian continued. “We spend years in the lab, and to see our technology have an impact on someone’s quality of life, like an amputee to perceive the natural thermal world, is incredibly satisfying.”
Capable of generating realistic and informative thermal signals for human perception — at a fraction of the energy and size compared to today’s cooling technologies — the devices’ low-profile, high-speed, and lightweight nature make them suitable for skin surface applications without hindrances that could affect movement.
“It has been great to see the translation of this APL-developed thermoelectric technology into the healthcare domain through this first-of-kind demonstration in an amputee,” said David Drewry, a biomedical engineer and program manager within APL’s National Health Mission Area. “We look forward to expanding the results in more robust clinical trials and integrating the device into other wearable form factors that can be readily deployed to individuals in need of sensory restoration or haptic feedback.”
Katy Carneal, a biomedical engineer and assistant program manager a biomedical engineer and assistant program manager who leads innovative health-related research at APL sees a vast set of future applications for the miniaturized thermoelectric technology. “There are so many ways that pressure and temperature sensations impact the human body,” said Carneal. “In addition to improving quality of life for amputees, we’ve opened a lot of research doors that can help us study and find new treatments for neuromuscular diseases or chronic pain.”
Dr. Paul Pasquina, the chair of PM&R at USU, echoed that enthusiasm while praising the work of the APL team. “What a privilege it is to work with such expert engineers to come up with solutions to help real-world patients, including our wounded warriors with limb loss,” he said.
APL is uniquely qualified to advance the art-of-the-possible for novel health applications by exploring this intersection of materials science and electronic device engineering with biology and neuroscience. In addition to the Revolutionizing Prosthetics program, APL is making significant advances in neural interface research, improving genomics tools and monitoring physical fatigue to prevent warfighter injuries among many other advancements in the National Health Mission Area.
Evoking natural thermal perceptions using a thin-film thermoelectric device with high cooling power density and speed
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
27-Jul-2023
COI STATEMENT
R.V., L.E.O., M.H., J.M.P. and R.S.A. are inventors on intellectual property pertaining to thin-#ilm thermoelectric devices and US patents 11,227,988 and 11,532,778 and application 18/071,789. R.V. and J.M.P. are inventors on US patent 10,903,139. The Johns Hopkins University is the applicant on these patents. The other authors declare no competing interests.
Monday, August 16, 2021
Inflatable robotic hand gives amputees real-time tactile control
Prosthetic enables a wide range of daily activities, such as zipping a suitcase, shaking hands, and petting a cat.
IMAGE: AN MIT-DEVELOPED INFLATABLE ROBOTIC HAND GIVES AMPUTEES REAL-TIME TACTILE CONTROL. THE SMART HAND IS SOFT AND ELASTIC, WEIGHS ABOUT HALF A POUND, AND COSTS A FRACTION OF COMPARABLE PROSTHETICS.view more
CREDIT: COURTESY OF XUANHE ZHAO, SHAOTING LIN, ET AL
For the more than 5 million people in the world who have undergone an upper-limb amputation, prosthetics have come a long way. Beyond traditional mannequin-like appendages, there is a growing number of commercial neuroprosthetics — highly articulated bionic limbs, engineered to sense a user’s residual muscle signals and robotically mimic their intended motions.
But this high-tech dexterity comes at a price. Neuroprosthetics can cost tens of thousands of dollars and are built around metal skeletons, with electrical motors that can be heavy and rigid.
Now engineers at MIT and Shanghai Jiao Tong University have designed a soft, lightweight, and potentially low-cost neuroprosthetic hand. Amputees who tested the artificial limb performed daily activities, such as zipping a suitcase, pouring a carton of juice, and petting a cat, just as well as — and in some cases better than —those with more rigid neuroprosthetics.
The researchers found the prosthetic, designed with a system for tactile feedback, restored some primitive sensation in a volunteer’s residual limb. The new design is also surprisingly durable, quickly recovering after being struck with a hammer or run over with a car.
The smart hand is soft and elastic, and weighs about half a pound. Its components total around $500 — a fraction of the weight and material cost associated with more rigid smart limbs.
“This is not a product yet, but the performance is already similar or superior to existing neuroprosthetics, which we’re excited about,” says Xuanhe Zhao, professor of mechanical engineering and of civil and environmental engineering at MIT. “There’s huge potential to make this soft prosthetic very low cost, for low-income families who have suffered from amputation.”
Zhao and his colleagues have published their work today in Nature Biomedical Engineering. Co-authors include MIT postdoc Shaoting Lin, along with Guoying Gu, Xiangyang Zhu, and collaborators at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China.
Big Hero hand
The team’s pliable new design bears an uncanny resemblance to a certain inflatable robot in the animated film “Big Hero 6.” Like the squishy android, the team’s artificial hand is made from soft, stretchy material — in this case, the commercial elastomer EcoFlex. The prosthetic comprises five balloon-like fingers, each embedded with segments of fiber, similar to articulated bones in actual fingers. The bendy digits are connected to a 3-D-printed “palm,” shaped like a human hand.
Rather than controlling each finger using mounted electrical motors, as most neuroprosthetics do, the researchers used a simple pneumatic system to precisely inflate fingers and bend them in specific positions. This system, including a small pump and valves, can be worn at the waist, significantly reducing the prosthetic’s weight.
Lin developed a computer model to relate a finger’s desired position to the corresponding pressure a pump would have to apply to achieve that position. Using this model, the team developed a controller that directs the pneumatic system to inflate the fingers, in positions that mimic five common grasps, including pinching two and three fingers together, making a balled-up fist, and cupping the palm.
The pneumatic system receives signals from EMG sensors — electromyography sensors that measure electrical signals generated by motor neurons to control muscles. The sensors are fitted at the prosthetic’s opening, where it attaches to a user’s limb. In this arrangement, the sensors can pick up signals from a residual limb, such as when an amputee imagines making a fist.
The team then used an existing algorithm that “decodes” muscle signals and relates them to common grasp types. They used this algorithm to program the controller for their pneumatic system. When an amputee imagines, for instance, holding a wine glass, the sensors pick up the residual muscle signals, which the controller then translates into corresponding pressures. The pump then applies those pressures to inflate each finger and produce the amputee’s intended grasp.
Going a step further in their design, the researchers looked to enable tactile feedback — a feature that is not incorporated in most commercial neuroprosthetics. To do this, they stitched to each fingertip a pressure sensor, which when touched or squeezed produces an electrical signal proportional to the sensed pressure. Each sensor is wired to a specific location on an amputee’s residual limb, so the user can “feel” when the prosthetic’s thumb is pressed, for example, versus the forefinger.
Good grip
To test the inflatable hand, the researchers enlisted two volunteers, each with upper-limb amputations. Once outfitted with the neuroprosthetic, the volunteers learned to use it by repeatedly contracting the muscles in their arm while imagining making five common grasps.
After completing this 15-minute training, the volunteers were asked to perform a number of standardized tests to demonstrate manual strength and dexterity. These tasks included stacking checkers, turning pages, writing with a pen, lifting heavy balls, and picking up fragile objects like strawberries and bread. They repeated the same tests using a more rigid, commercially available bionic hand and found that the inflatable prosthetic was as good, or even better, at most tasks, compared to its rigid counterpart.
One volunteer was also able to intuitively use the soft prosthetic in daily activities, for instance to eat food like crackers, cake, and apples, and to handle objects and tools, such as laptops, bottles, hammers, and pliers. This volunteer could also safely manipulate the squishy prosthetic, for instance to shake someone’s hand, touch a flower, and pet a cat.
In a particularly exciting exercise, the researchers blindfolded the volunteer and found he could discern which prosthetic finger they poked and brushed. He was also able to “feel” bottles of different sizes that were placed in the prosthetic hand, and lifted them in response. The team sees these experiments as a promising sign that amputees can regain a form of sensation and real-time control with the inflatable hand.
The team has filed a patent on the design, through MIT, and is working to improve its sensing and range of motion.
“We now have four grasp types. There can be more,” Zhao says. “This design can be improved, with better decoding technology, higher-density myoelectric arrays, and a more compact pump that could be worn on the wrist. We also want to customize the design for mass production, so we can translate soft robotic technology to benefit society.”
###
Written by Jennifer Chu, MIT News Office
JOURNAL
Nature Biomedical Engineering
DOI
10.1038/s41551-021-00767-0
ARTICLE TITLE
A soft neuroprosthetic hand providing simultaneous myoelectric control and tactile feedback
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
16-Aug-2021
Sunday, October 10, 2021
‘Life changer’: Saskatchewan amputee raising awareness about new procedure
A Saskatchewan man who had one of his legs amputated nearly four decades ago has now become the first patient in the province to undergo a surgery called osseointegration of limbs and now he wants to spread awareness about this life-altering procedure. Taz Dhaliwal has the details.
A Saskatchewanamputee wants to raise awareness about a procedure he says has greatly improved his quality of life.
Ron Patterson is now the first person in Saskatchewan to have had osseointegration limb replacement performed on his amputated leg, but he’s hoping that will quickly change.
Osseointegration limb replacement involves fusing the bone to a metallic implant.
Ron broke his ankle in 1978, months after marrying his wife, Shelly.
“I used to drive an earthmover, heavy equipment for building roads and I slipped on some frost on the ladder and went down and landed on a rock,” Ron said.
Ron’s ankle was put in a cast and later operated on and put back in a cast. He says a window wasn’t cut into the cast, so it couldn’t be cleaned. The wound bled and later become infected.
Ron was given two choices; take drugs for the rest of his life that would cause him to lose his driver’s license, or lose part of his leg.
He decided to let doctors amputate his leg in 1984.
Ron wore a socket prosthesis for over 30 years. He said for about 20 years, the socket worked well for him, but then he developed sores around the stump, along with a reliance on prescription drugs.
“I was on morphine and it just got to the point, my body got used to morphine, so they put me on fentanyl and it was starting to get to the point my body was used to fentanyl and it wasn’t working as it was when it first started,” Ron explained.
He also developed neuroma, which Ron said was painful when he put pressure on it.
The pain got so bad Ron had to sell his cattle.
This is when Ron started looking into other options, including osseointegration limb replacement.
He was referred to a doctor In Alberta who had good and bad news for him.
“The bad news was that they were only going to do people from Alberta,” Ron said.
Dr. Robert Turcotte is an orthopedic surgeon at McGill Health Centre specializing in musculoskeletal cancer and osseointegration.
“By having this piece of metal anchored into the bone, sticking out through the skin, we allow the amputee to directly connect to the prosthesis through the metal implant, thus avoiding the discomfort and limitations of the socket prosthesis,” Turcotte explained.
The surgery is ideal for amputees who have experienced pain and discomfort when wearing a socket.
Turcotte said in the warmer months, stumps can become hot and wet from sweat, causing the socket to swivel, which makes walking difficult.
Socket prosthetics also take five to 10 minutes to put on, especially for mid-thigh amputees.
The osseointegration prosthetic takes 10 seconds to click on.
Turcotte says this is especially helpful for bi-lateral amputees.
Turcotte said the program in Montreal has the ability to perform 50 osseointegration surgeries a year, but COVID-19 has impacted how many patients they can operate on. He estimates there are 10 to 15 patients currently on the waitlist for the procedure.
5:42Amputee body builder inspires millionsAmputee body builder inspires millions – Aug 9, 2021
The surgery and prosthesis are also costly, Turcotte said.
At the moment, Quebec covers the surgery under its health-care system. Turcotte’s office needs to be granted permission to perform the surgery on Ontario residents from that province’s health-care system.
Ron had his surgery covered by a workers compensation fund from the government of Saskatchewan, although he said it took around five years for the province to finally give the green light on their end in order for him to be able to get the operation.
Turcotte explained that some provinces are reluctant to cover the surgery because they believe it to be experimental.
“It is not anymore. We know a bit about the complication and the short and mid-term result. For most of our patients, this is a life changer. It gives them a degree of liberty, of freedom, of the ability to wear their prosthesis all day long,” Turcotte said.
About 30 osseointegration surgeries have been performed in Montreal so far. The first procedure was completed three years ago. Turcotte added that demand is low for the operation.
“We don’t have hundreds of amputees waiting for the surgery.”
Turcotte said the surgery is more common for lower limb amputees but mid-arm amputees have also had osseointegration completed successfully.
There are limitations on who can get the surgery, too. Patients need to be of normal body weight, not smoke, or have significant health conditions.
After going through with the procedure in November 2020, Ron said he’s sharing his story so other amputees can now about the procedure and decide if it’s something they want to pursue.
“I can pretty well do anything I could before with my leg,” Ron said.
“It’s like having your own leg again.”
He added he could even go back into raising cattle if he was younger.
Both Ron and his wife said although he missed out on playing several sports with their three sons when they were younger, however, they’re grateful he’ll at least be able to do more with his grandchildren now.
“I feel like a million dollars. I do. It’s just my quality of life is back and everybody that sees me and talks to me, the new me (versus) before and the drugs I was living on, they just said I look a lot better (and) I seem a lot healthier.”
Ron also said he’s happy to be drug free now and not have to take strong prescription medication like fentanyl or morphine.
“I can walk and do just as much as anybody else in the world.”
Ron called the day he had the operation “the best day of my life” and he hopes the surgery can become more available to other amputees.
He wishes he could have gotten it done 30 years earlier.
Ron said he’s more than willing to speak to anyone who wishes to reach out to him with questions about the procedure and his personal experience with it. He said he just want to helps others reach a more comfortable lifestyle as amputees with the possibilities that are out there.
Shelly is just as glad Ron had the procedure, saying he wasn’t the easiest person to live with earlier.
“He was really irritable and probably a lot of that was also due to the pain, but also because of the drugs. I know because he’s a totally different person since he’s off of (drugs),” Shelly said.
Shelly agrees with Ron that if an amputee qualifies for the surgery, they should look into it.
“I just wish it would have happened a long, long time ago. But that’s life,” Shelly said.
Thursday, October 30, 2025
Beyond the finish line at Cybathlon 2024: Omnia’s pilot performance and the role of teamwork
On Science Robotics, a focus article on the OMNIA technology developed by the Italian Institute of Technology, with a highlight on the experience of Andrea Modica, a transfemoral amputee and the pilot of the device
Credit: IIT-Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia/Cybathlon
Genoa (Italy), 30 October 2025: One year after the international Cybathlon 2024 competition, the Italian team has published a focus article in Science Robotics on the Omnia bionic leg, which took first place in the leg prosthesis race. The article highlights the experience of Andrea Modica, a transfemoral amputee and the device’s pilot, who successfully completed 9 out of 10 tasks in 2 minutes and 57 seconds. The Omnia prosthesis was developed at the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT – Italian Institute of Technology) by the joint Rehab Technologies IIT-INAIL Lab, coordinated by Matteo Laffranchi.
The Cybathlon 2024 marked the debut of Omnia, a novel lower limb prosthetic prototype designed for individuals with transfemoral amputations. This system comprises a knee (Unico) and an ankle (Armonico), both motorized. Omnia was the only device to reach the "Leg Prosthesis" final without using commercial components. Its pilot, Andrea Modica, successfully completed 9 out of 10 tasks, including navigating a balance beam while carrying buckets, ascending and descending stairs with objects, and traversing an inclined plane.
Andrea Modica is a transfemoral amputee who lost his leg in a motorcycle accident in 2021. Since then, Modica has shown remarkable determination, first returning to sports, then progressing to Paralympic-level skiing, and stepping into the world of competitive prosthetic technology. He is currently Support Technician at Rehab Technologies - INAIL-IIT lab.
Modica was not only the pilot for the Omnia system but also an active contributor to its design and optimization. His insights, gained by comparing Omnia with his daily-use prosthesis, helped the research team to shape key improvements in both the software and hardware of the device. From adjusting stiffness to fine-tuning propulsion, each component was tailored to match the varied demands of the Cybathlon’s obstacle-based tasks. During months of training, Modica repeatedly practiced each task to improve precision, efficiency, and safety.
Reflecting on the event, Andrea Modica described it as a deeply meaningful experience, not just for the achievement, but for the community he found among other competitors. His role in shaping Omnia exemplifies IIT’s user-centered philosophy, where real-world feedback drives innovation.
The standout feature of the Omnia system is the communication between the two prosthetic components, Unico and Armonico, which exchange information from integrated sensors and adjust parameters for optimal performance across various tasks. The Unico knee combines hydraulic and electric technologies. The hydraulic system effectively aids in level walking or descending, ensuring quiet, smooth movement and energy efficiency. In contrast, the electric technology, supported by a patented system, provides active assistance during tasks such as climbing stairs, ascending steep slopes, or standing from a seated position. In the complete Omnia leg configuration, the transition between hydraulic and electric modes occurs automatically, thanks to the synergy of the two prostheses and advanced implemented algorithms.
The Unico prosthesis is equipped with a battery that lasts a full day under maximum usage and is suitable for both right and left knee prosthetics, supporting up to 125 kilograms. The device is customizable based on the user's height and can be adjusted at the software level to match daily activity patterns, whether sedentary or active.
The Armonico ankle features an elastic foot coupled with an innovative screw mechanism, assisting the user during the initial foot strike by reducing heel impact for enhanced comfort and preventing tripping by lifting the toe during each step. Unlike passive foot prostheses, Armonico actively amplifies the ankle’s flexion angle, providing enhanced stability on sloped surfaces and ensuring a more natural movement. It is available in both right and left configurations and has a battery life of 24 hours.
The Omnia bionic leg with semipowered knee and ankle wins the Cybathlon 2024 leg prosthesis race
Article Publication Date
29-Oct-2025
The focus article in Science Robotics highlights the experience of Andrea Modica, a transfemoral amputee and the device’s pilot, who successfully completed 9 out of 10 tasks in 2 minutes and 57 seconds at Cybathlon 2024. He is currently Support Technician at Rehab Technologies - INAIL-IIT lab.
Omnia's team secured first place in the leg prosthesis race at Cybathlon 2024 (IMAGE)
The Italian team has published a focus article in Science Robotics on the Omnia bionic leg, which took first place in the leg prosthesis race at Cybathlon 2024. The Omnia prosthesis was developed at the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia by the joint Rehab Technologies IIT-INAIL Lab coordinated by Matteo Laffranchi.
The Cybathlon 2024 marked the debut of Omnia, a novel lower limb prosthetic prototype designed for individuals with transfemoral amputations. This system comprises a knee (Unico) and an ankle (Armonico), both motorized. Omnia was the only device to reach the "Leg Prosthesis" final without using commercial components.
Credit IIT-Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia/Cybathlon
