Abstract Summary
This pilot study investigated the impacts of a whole-body, powered exoskeleton on low-back muscle activation and joint ranges-of-motion (ROM) in a load carriage task performed by able-bodied individuals. The prototype exoskeleton (Guardian XOTM, Sarcos Robotics) had 16 active degrees of freedom. After an initial training period, participants (five males) performed a load-carriage task with a 20kg suitcase, with and without the exoskeleton. The exoskeleton reduced erector spinae muscle activity for all participants (median reduction = 25%, range = 7-41%). Sagittal plane ROM was lower for the hip and knee joints (up to 60% and 68%, respectively) when using the exoskeleton for load-carriage. Our results present preliminary evidence of the potential for powered exoskeletons to reduce physical demands in heavy industrial labour, supporting the need of design heuristics for exoskeleton control input tuning, and further development and testing of this platform.
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