Sensors for leg-replacement in a few cases

[samhitha]

Hi.
Here're few things I've been thinking about since the past week. I'm not even sure if it is possible. Please see:

1. If a person has met with an accident and has lost his legs, in usual cases, a knee-replacement or an artificial leg surgery is done. But is it possible that in a few patients due to heavy damage, neural control over the limb, artificial or not becomes impossible? In such a case, is it possible to put robotic limbs in the place of the damage and because neural control over that part is null, maybe the robotic limbs could be controlled by the patient with a remote or something? Hope this isn't sounding like sci-fi!

2. A bat happened to come into our balcony a few weeks ago. After some time, my mum slowly placed it on a tree-branch with a stick. And then while I was over-hearing my mum talk about bats in general with someone, an idea stuck to me: Can a prototype be built that can, imitating bats, help the visually-impaired to travel or do their daily works by sending an ultra-sonic sound that would lead them to the right destination (like bats)? Is it even possible?

Please reply. It would answer many questions of mine!

[SciB]

Hi Samhitha,

You really do have a lot of different interests for projects!

With regard to your idea for a controllable robotic prosthesis, this is being tested right now by Dean Kamen's group [http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/biom ... a-approval] with a grant from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The researcher's at DEKA created a robotic arm and hand that has sensors built into the muscles adjacent to the arm connected to actuators and controllers in the prosthesis. There are also remote controllers that are actuated by the wearer's feet. I think this is definitely one of the coolest areas of bioengineering right now. Helping amputees is just one aspect of the research. Creating a man-machine interface brings up all sorts of possibilities from increasing strength and speed to linking the brain directly to a computer. Sci-fi ideas are just engineering challenges that we haven't met yet!

Your idea about echolocation for the blind has also been used by a blind person who gets around by making clicks with his tongue and listening to the echos: http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-19524962
I think you could create a device that would emit the clicks so the person did not have to make them, but would still be able to echolocate from the sounds. Interpreting the sounds to know where objects are in space, how big they are, whether they are moving, etc. takes a lot of practice. The younger you start the easier it is.

You have some really great interests! Now how are you going to turn them into a doable science fair project?

As I said in the other post, once you have decided on a project please confine your posts to one forum (unless you need the help of an expert in some other discipline) and a single thread. This makes it much easier for the experts to read what has already been said and make better answers.

Let us know when you decide on a project so we can help you at the planning stage. The experimental set-up can be critical and expert feedback at that level can help avoid major problems later on.

Good luck!

Sybee

[samhitha]

Thanks for answering all my questions! And also it was very encouraging!
I need some time to think about which of them I should be taking for the Google Science Fair the next year. But you see, the place where I live doesn't have many 'help-students-in-research kind of facilities but I could at least try and ask the near-by university. I'm very interested in my ideas, but sadly, I would have to choose based on the resources available. And the BBC link was very helpful. Maybe I need more resources for 'big' things like these. Sara Volz who won the Intel ISEF by conducting experiments in her room might just be my inspiration now. I'll try my best and when I decide, I will inform to ScienceBuddies what my project is going to be.

[samhitha]

This idea is actually not related to math or computers but I wanted to continue in this post only:

Anthropogenic aerosols have been reported to be main cause of ozone-depletion and these particles travel up to a very great height. I want to check the effect of these aerosols on plants. Because even if these colloidal particles settle on plants there may be some obstruction to the plants due to which it's capacity to take CO2 maybe decreasing. As we know, the greenhouse effect has come from the original Greenhouse Experiment where a glass house or small structure was taken and CO2 was let in and the graph of photosynthesis started rising rapidly and then suddenly dropped to 0, thus showing excess CO2 is harmful. So how would it be if the same experiment would be tried but with Aerosols instead of CO2 and maybe, it actually does have an effect of the plant. I've tried researching on aerosols and their settlement but I've not found anything about effect of aerosols on plants. My target date to finalize a project is on 22-October-2014 after which I'll be starting my project.

P.S. For the Science in Action thing, can you suggest any topics: like farming or anything?

Please leave your valuable suggestions. Thanks!

[samhitha]

Hi.
I'm helpless because none of my ideas can be practically done, by me. I have no resources for those and I don't even know how to code. Can you help with any project that does not require high-level things....maybe something related to plants - I have access to a nearby lab. Thanks for the support. Help!

[dcnick96]

Hi, Samhitha. I'm sorry you're not going to be able to pursue one of your original topics, as they are very interesting. Have you looked at the Science Buddies Selection Topic Wizard? Based on you answering a few questions related to your interests, time allowed, level of difficulty, etc, it will provided a list of recommended projects.

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... deas.shtml

I hope this helps. Please write back if you have any further questions. Don't give up. Perhaps this year while doing a project that is suited better to your available resources, reach out to nearby universities or if there are any research companies related to your areas of interest to see if they would be interested in helping you next year. Don't forget to ask your science teacher for help in this. They may have access to resources / contacts you are not aware of.

If you are still interested in learning about prothestics, along with the excellent resource Sybee provided, check out this talk by Hugh Herr. He lost both legs in a climbing accident and now works at Massachusetts Institute of Technology building the next generation of bionic limbs. He built a prosthetic for a ballroom dancer that lost a leg in the Boston bombing. It is a very inspirational story, and the website will provide links for further information.
https://www.ted.com/talks/hugh_herr_the ... _and_dance

Good luck!