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Department of Engineering, ICT and Technologies for Energy and Transport Patent Title Device for the rehabilitation of movements of the foot. Ref. CNR 10172 Assignee(s): CNR CNR Institute: ITIA Main Inventor: Matteo Malosio Countries: IT, EP, US Priority date: 20/12/2011 Abstract The present invention relates to neuromuscular rehabilitation, referring in particular to the neurorehabilitation of the ankle, describing a device and a method ensuring foot movement motions highly compatible with physiological movements of the ankle musculoskeletal apparatus. To achieve this goal a fully-parallel three- degrees-of-freedom spherical kinematic architecture has been exploited and specifically configured in order to guarantee that the center of rotation of the foot support is placed nearby the actual center of rotation of the foot, at the center of the ankle articulation. A force sensor and additional feedback signals, as electromyography, can be integrated to be exploited by the control loop implementing assistive control logics. Background Devices for the rehabilitation of the foot with more than one degree of freedom are typically characterized by the center of rotation of the platform which is not configured nearby the actual center of rotation of the ankle; it leads compensatory and desired motions by the patients and reduces the overall therapy effectiveness. Technology The device comprises a mobile platform supporting the foot connected to the ground by means of a spherical parallel kinematic mechanism with three rotational degrees of freedom allowing only rotations of the platform with respect to the supporting base around axes intersecting in a single point nearby the actual center of rotation of the foot. Advantages and Applications The present device permits a control of active, passive and assisted movements, compatibly with the natural anatomic conditions and physiological movements of the ankle articulation. Typical applications are related to neuromuscular rehabilitation of foot movements. Development stage The first prototype is completely assembled and running. The control system is continuously being developed. Required functionalities has been assessed exploiting a group of healthy subjects. Clinical validation will start soon. 87