Bionic Fingertip Lets Amputee Feel With Phantom Limb

Researchers in Switzerland have made a huge leap in the development of touch-enabled prosthetics, giving an amputee the ability to experience textures in his phantom hand using an artificial fingertip connected to the nerves in his arm.

The technology was developed past Silvestro Micera and his team at the Swiss Federal Plant of Engineering in Lausanne along with Calogero Oddo and his crew at the Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies in Italia. Their research, published today in the peer-reviewed scientific periodical eLife, may speed up the development of bionic prosthesis that are capable of mimicking touch.

The researchers say the amputee, Dennis Aabo Sørensen, is the first person in the world to recognize texture using a bionic fingertip continued to surgically implanted electrodes.

"The stimulation felt most like what I would experience with my hand," Sørensen said in a statement. "I nonetheless feel my missing paw, it is always clenched in a fist." While trying out the bionic fingertip, nevertheless, "I felt the texture sensations at the tip of the index finger of my phantom hand," he said.

The researchers connected the sensor-equipped bogus fingertip to electrodes that were surgically implanted to the nerves in Sørensen'due south arm. A machine then moved the bionic fingertip'south over different pieces of textured plastic, generating electrical signals. These signals were translated into a series of "electrical spikes" that were delivered to Sørensen'due south nerves, giving him the sensation of feeling textures.

The researchers say Sørensen was able to distinguish between rough and smooth surfaces 96 percent of the fourth dimension.

About Angela Moscaritolo

Angela Moscaritolo

Angela Moscaritolo is PCMag's expert on fitness and smart dwelling house products. Teaching yoga for nearly 10 years has helped her in evaluating a range of continued wellness products including fitness trackers, heart rate monitors, rowers, smart scales, stationary bikes, strength grooming machines, treadmills, and more. Angela also tests smart dwelling house devices from her ranch in Florida, including air purifiers, kitchen appliances, and robot vacuums, merely to proper noun a few.