Dexter hand

An anthropomorphic hand for everyday use and advanced research applications. A smart below-elbow prosthetic, which uses sensors and a camera to "feel" its environment and act intelligently. The prosthetic is an intuitive, and intelligent alternative to existing prosthetic hands. Dexter can adjust its position, orientation, and grip based on visual and force feedback to detect objects, determine appropriate grasps, and maintain object orientation without the need for extensive user input. This intelligent hand can be used for advanced research applications and everyday use.

Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Specifications

Weight 530 g
Speed of Finger Curl1.8 s
Worm Gears8
Motors hand 5 6V Pololu 1000:1 Micro Metal Gearmotors (1600 mA)
Motor wrist 1 1000:1 Micro Metal Gearmotor
Microcontroller1 Arduino Mega 2560
Sensors1 IMU (inertial measurement unit )
5 force sensors
7 potentiometers
Battery1 11.1V, 730 mAh Thunder Power RC lithium polymer ba
Manufacturing technique 3D-printing (ABS)
Software (image processing) ROS
Costs 1425 $

Overview

A smart below-elbow prosthetic, which uses sensors and a camera to "feel" its environment and act intelligently. The prosthetic is an intuitive, and intelligent alternative to existing prosthetic hands. 

Dexter can adjust its position, orientation, and grip based on visual and force feedback to detect objects, determine appropriate grasps, and maintain object orientation without the need for extensive user input. This intelligent hand can be used for advanced research applications and everyday use. 

This prosthetic utilizes 3D imagery and object classification to locate the desired object and move the hand into the correct orientation to grasp. With one input from the user, the hand will grasp the object, and maintain the correct force and orientation to move the object without crushing, dropping, or spilling the contents. 

To maintain a modular design, the forearm was created as a separate component of the overall design. The wrist and forearm are connected by a motor shaft that extends out of the forearm into a universal mounting hub. This motor provides the z-axis rotation. The distal end of the forearm is the same size as the bottom wrist, but gets gradually larger as it extends, ultimately ending in a 1 cm offset on the proximal end of the forearm. This creates a more realistic, human-like tapered appearance than a circular or rectangular cross-section.

References

Contains everything from the background story, to mechanical design, electronic design, and software. Describes the bill of materials and cost breakdown.

S. Mayer, G. O’Dell, Y. Batu Sipka. - Final report

Control and testing software for the prosthetic arm.

https://github.com

Wevolver 2023