Prosthetics 2009 Team Delivers 1st Advanced Limb Prototype

An international team led by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Md., has developed a prototype of the first fully integrated prosthetic arm that can be controlled naturally, provide sensory feedback and allows for eight degrees of freedom—a level of control far beyond the current state of the art for prosthetic limbs, researchers say.

Proto 1, developed for the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Revolutionizing Prosthetics Program, is a complete limb system that also includes a virtual environment used for patient training, clinical configuration, and to record limb movements and control signals during clinical investigations.

The DARPA prosthetics program is an ambitious effort to provide the most advanced medical and rehabilitative technologies for military personnel injured in the line of duty. Over the last year, the APL-led Revolutionizing Prosthetics 2009 (RP 2009) team has worked to develop a prosthetic arm that will restore significant function and sensory perception of the natural limb. Proto 1 and its virtual environment system were delivered to DARPA ahead of schedule, and Proto 1 was fitted for clinical evaluations conducted by team partners at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (RIC) in January and February.

“This progress represents the first major step in a very challenging program that spans four years and involves more than 30 partners, including government agencies, universities, and private firms from the United States, Europe, and Canada,” says APL’s Stuart Harshbarger, who leads the program. “The development of this first prototype within the first year of this program is a remarkable accomplishment by a highly talented and motivated team and serves as validation that we will be able to implement DARPA’s vision to provide, by 2009, a mechanical arm that closely mimics the properties and sensory perception of a biological limb.”

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Space Technology Benefits Medical Community

A small group of Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab researchers, in collaboration with physicians from the Johns Hopkins Scleroderma Center in Baltimore, developed and recently completed initial trials for a miniature device to help physicians characterize Raynaud’s disease and measure treatment effectiveness.

“The Ambulatory Raynaud’s Monitor is a tiny, Band-Aid-like device that enables physicians to objectively characterize a patient’s condition, determine its severity and measure symptoms in real time,” says Frederick Wigley, director of the Hopkins Scleroderma Center and one of the country’s leading scleroderma experts, who asked the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), in Laurel, Md., to develop the device after reading about APL’s work developing miniature devices for spacecraft. “Until now, Raynaud’s research has been crippled without such a device.”

The small, low-cost monitor wraps around a patient’s finger and is secured with a bandage or medical tape. It contains two sensors that alternately record skin and ambient temperatures – indicators of surface blood flow – every 36 seconds. Interactive controls permit a patient to record the date and time of a suspected Raynaud’s attack. A week’s data is held by the monitor’s electronics and is retained even if the device’s power is unexpectedly interrupted.
Physicians can easily download data into a computer or PDA (personal digital assistant).

Software developed by APL enables physicians to quickly and easily display and plot data, which could be done during a patient’s appointment to provide real-time feedback. The monitoring system’s batteries store enough energy to operate for several months, and devices can be cleaned and reinitialized for use with multiple patients.

Triggered by cold temperatures or stress, Raynaud’s is characterized by numbness and coldness in the fingers, toes, ears and/or nose when blood vessels in those areas constrict during attacks. Insufficient blood flow near the skin’s surface also causes patients to experience skin color changes and varying levels of discomfort. Limited blood flow to the extremities can potentially lead to permanent loss of function. Raynaud’s can occur on its own, or be secondary to another condition, such as auto-immune disorders like scleroderma or lupus.

Field TrialsThe device recently underwent initial testing on patients with Raynaud’s being treated at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. Patients wore a monitor for one week in their homes, pressing an “event button” on the device to indicate when a Raynaud’s event was occurring. The data – processed by APL engineers and evaluated by JHMI physicians – indicates Raynaud’s events can be successfully identified. Patients said the devices are comfortable and easy to use.

“The data from this preliminary study suggests that the monitor can help scientists and physicians learn more about Raynaud’s phenomenon and help investigators evaluate the effectiveness of drugs being developed to treat this disease,” says APL’s Binh Le, one of the inventors of the device.

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NASA Spacecraft Gets Boost From Jupiter for Pluto Encounter

NASA's New Horizons spacecraft successfully completed a flyby of Jupiter early this morning,using the massive planet's gravity to pick up speed for its 3-billion mile voyage to Pluto and the unexplored Kuiper Belt region beyond, NASA says.

"We're on our way to Pluto," says New Horizons Mission Operations Manager Alice Bowman of Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), Laurel, Md. "The swingby was a success; the spacecraft is on course and performed just as we expected."

New Horizons came within 1.4 million miles of Jupiter at 12:43 a.m.EST, placing the spacecraft on target to reach the Pluto system in July 2015. During its closest approach, the spacecraft could not communicate with Earth, but gathered science data on the giant planet, its moons and atmosphere, NASA says.

At 11:55 a.m. EST mission operators at APL established contact through NASA's Deep Space Network and confirmed New Horizons' health and status, the space agency says.

The fastest spacecraft ever launched, New Horizons is gaining nearly 9,000 mph from Jupiter's gravity -- accelerating to more than 52,000 mph. The spacecraft has covered approximately 500 million miles since its launchin January 2006 and reached Jupiter faster than seven previous spacecraft to visit the solar system's largest planet. New Horizons raced through a target just 500 miles across, the equivalent of a skeet shooter in Washington hitting a target in Baltimore on the first try, NASA says.

New Horizons has been running through an intense six-month long systems check that will include more than 700 science observations of the Jupiter system by the end of June. More than half of those observations are taking place this week, including scans of Jupiter's turbulent atmosphere, measurements of its magnetic cocoon, surveys of its delicate rings, maps of the composition and topography of the large moons Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto, and a detailed look at volcanic activity on Io.

"We designed the entire Jupiter encounter to be a tough test for the mission team and our spacecraft, and we're passing the test," says New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern from the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colo. "We're not only learning what we can expect from the spacecraft when we visit Pluto in eight years, we're already getting some stunning science results at Jupiter -- and there's more to come."

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