Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325

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Mechatronics
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/mechatronics

Robotic index nger prosthesis using stackable double 4-BAR mechanisms

Giho Jang, Chulwoo Lee, Hoyul Lee, Youngjin Choi
Department of Electronic Systems Engineering, Hanyang University, Ansan 426-791, South Korea

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper suggests a robotic index nger prosthesis realized to be one degree-of-freedom by using stack-
Received 20 January 2012 able double 4-bar mechanisms. Also its control method makes use of two electromyographic (EMG) sig-
Accepted 20 January 2013 nals measured on skin surfaces of exor digitorum supercialis (FDS) and extensor indicis (EI) in a lower
Available online 6 March 2013
arm. In this paper, we assume that EMG signals have some relations with velocity of muscle movement
by neglecting nger dynamics due to its negligible small mass. In order to obtain desired position and
Keywords: velocity of robotic index nger, the measured raw EMG signals are processed by sequential procedures
Stackable double 4-bar mechanism
such as root mean squaring, applying threshold operation to extract the initial burst part, subtracting
Electromyography (EMG)
Robotic index nger prosthesis
antagonistic EMG signal, and integrating by every 2 millisecond. Finally the effectiveness of the suggested
mechanism and control method is veried through experiments.
2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction [11]. It was able to be fabricated relatively strong and lightweight

An amputation deteriorates not only physical abilities due to
muscle retraction, but also social mental problem due to the fact
that he/she is different from others. Researches on robotic prosthe-
ses are necessary to encourage the amputee in the social activities.
Furthermore prosthetic ngers have been developed as a part of
hand although there exist more amputees who lose their single n-
ger than hand. Also, nger prosthesis has been mainly made by a
skilled artist using his/her own techniques in sculpting and experi-
ence to imitate living nger in viewpoint of appearance. Most pros-
thetic ngers have not considered a functional mobility to pursue
cooperative motion with living ngers. In this paper we are to de-
velop a robotic index nger controlled by EMG signals of muscles
in the lower arm in real-time fashion.
Almost all robotic hands have been developed in such a way to
grasp something well with two or more ngers in several decades
[115]. In detail, early robotic hands and ngers have used tendon-
driven mechanism actuated by two active motors for both exten-
sion and exion motions [17]. The tendon-driven was considered
as one of the muscle-like mechanisms but it was not easy to con-
trol because of nonlinearities of wire-pulling system itself. For this
reason, some researchers have studied new mechanism to make
robotic nger with high performance. For example, DLR hand,
which has one degree-of-freedom nger mechanism with gear
transmission for 3-phalanx motion, has been developed in [8
10]. Also, the 3-phalanx nger mechanism without using the gear
transmission and the wire-driven method has been released in
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: cyj@hanyang.ac.kr (Y. Choi).
because it made use of parallel structure and under-actuated
mechanism, possible to make human-like motion and grasp, and
easy to calculate position of the nger tip. Another type of ten-
don-driven mechanism with an active actuator and a passive
spring has been also proposed recently in [1215]. Though it is
not about robotic nger, a stackable 4-bar mechanism has been
suggested for fully actuated surgical manipulators in [16]. In this
paper, an under-actuated mechanism realized by one actuator is
proposed both by stacking double 4-bar linkage mechanisms and
by adopting slider-crank mechanism for driving input.
The EMG signal processing methods can be classied into time-
domain approach, frequency-domain approach, and EMG activa-
tion classication approach according to reference [17]. Time-do-
main methods contain Wilson amplitude method (WAMP) as
muscle contraction indicator [18], cepstrum method based on the
autoregressive coefcients (AR) [19], wavelet method [20], and
the PCA method to estimate continuous joint angles from EMG sig-
nals [21]. Differently from the time-domain approach, the fre-
quency-domain approach can be utilized as an indicator of motor
unit action potential (MUAP) that is a fundamental element of
EMG signal. The frequency-domain approach includes the random-
ness-based spectral analysis [22], the median frequency method
[23] and so on. The EMG activation classication approach includes
the linear discriminant analysis (LDA), hidden Markov model
(HMM) [17], Gaussian classiers [24], and neural networks [25].
The EMG signals have been utilized to control the robotic device
since Wiener had proposed the concept of an EMG-controlled pros-
thetic hand in [26]. There were several pioneering works for EMG-
controlled robots such as Waseda hand in [27], Boston arm in [28],
and Utah articial arm in [29]. Recent works are mainly involved
with neural networks to handle nonlinearities such as time-vary-

0957-4158/$ - see front matter 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.mechatronics.2013.01.006
 G. Jang et al. / Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325
ing, sensor location-varying, and environment-varying properties
in [3036]. The current state of the art about arm prosthesis would
be a DARPAs prosthetic arm controlled neuronally with 22 de-
grees-of-freedom in [37]. In this paper, we are focusing on real-
time digital processing of EMG signals for the cooperative motion
with living ngers.
This paper is organized as follows: Section 2 suggests both de-
sign and kinematics for robotic index nger prosthesis developed
by stacking double 4-bar mechanisms; Section 3 proposes both
preprocessing and real-time processing methods with respect to
the measured EMG signals; Section 4 discusses about experimental
results and Section 5 draws the conclusion of the paper.
2. Prosthetic index nger mechanism
Stackable double 4-bar linkages are utilized to develop one de-
gree-of-freedom prosthetic index nger as shown in Fig. 1. In de-
tail, the Fig. 1 illustrates three link layers, in which the rst link
layer of Fig. 1a consists of one slider-crank input linkage, the sec-
ond link layer of Fig. 1b consists of one input linkage and double
4-bar mechanisms, and the third link layer of Fig. 1c is composed
of one input linkage and two double 4-bar mechanisms. Also, all
link layers are stacked sequentially and then common bottom
joints such as A, B, D and G in Fig. 1 are joined each other and xed
together. Here, we should notice that one linear actuator through
three slider-crank linkages drives all link layers at the same time.
The robotic nger proposed in this paper has four advantages as
follows; First, it is able to separate the electrical components such
as the electric motor, wiring and sensors from working mechanical
nger, thus the suggested nger prosthesis can be fabricated only
with selective materials. Second, since the suggested nger con-
sists of 4-bar closed-chain mechanisms, it is structurally strong,
even though it is made thin. Third, it may be implanted as a pros-
thetic nger because it can be fabricated as a small size. Fourth, the
gear transmission is unnecessary because it makes use of linear
(a)
(b)
(c)
0 0
Fig. 1. Kinematic model of 1-DOF prosthetic nger mechanisms, l2B , and l2D0 , denote link lengths of line segments BC 02 , and D0 E02 in the second link layer, respectively. Also,
0 0 0 0
l3B ; l3D0 l3D and l3G0 , denote BC 03 , D0 E03 ; DF 03 and G0 H03 in the third link layer, respectively. Note that the lengths of line segments BD0 and DG0 are l1/2 and l2/2, respectively.
319
actuator type. In total the nger suggested in Fig. 1 consists of 20
links and 28 joints and its mobility is one.
Though the suggested nger consists of three slider-cranks and
three double 4-bar mechanisms, one common input linear actuator
operates it through three slider-cranks. For this, locations of joints
O and B are earthed at the ground. Also the last links of each layer
are triangular shapes and the bottom links of each layer are tied up
together. Since the ranges of motion of each joint of human index
nger become approximately 0 to 90 degrees, the joint angle range
of l1 in Fig. 1a should be 0 to 90 [deg] while the translational input
d is moving 0 to 10 [mm]. The angle ranges of other links, l2 and l3,
also should be 0 to 180 [deg] and 0 to 270 [deg], respectively, for
given input range of d. Here notice that we make use of double
4-bar mechanisms differently from the suggested in [13,16] so that
small input can provide large range of motion at an output link. In
addition, we are to suggest the comparison results with the previ-
ous ones as shown in Table 1 in viewpoint of mechanism structures
in order to show the properties of the proposed mechanism. Also
we should notice that the proposed mechanism is driven by the sli-
der-crank input while most other mechanisms are driven by the
tendon-type rotary input.
2.1. Kinematics of Prosthetic Finger
To explain how to solve the kinematics easily, we choose one
dyad from rst 4-bar of the Fig. 1b as shown in Fig. 2. The Fig. 2 de-
picts a core kinematic component useful in analyzing slider-crank
and 4-bar linkage. Positions of C 02 and D0 can be obtained from pre-
vious inputs with coordinates xC 02 ; yC 02 and xD0 ; yD0 respectively.
Let us assume that link lengths of l2C 0 and l2D0 are known and R in
Fig. 2 is a length between C 02 and D0 . (We will deal with how to de-
sign both link lengths of l2C 0 and l2D0 in next section.) The second
law of cosines is utilized to get both b1 and b2 as follows:
2 2 2 2
l2C 0  l2D0 R2 l2C0  l2D0  R2
cos b1 and cos b2 1
2l2C 0 R 2l2D0 R
320 G. Jang et al. / Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325

Table 1
Comparison of nger/hand mechanisms.

Driving type Kinematic type Stack-ability Active/passive DOF

LARM hand [11,12] Rotary 4-Bar No 1/2
Gosselin hand [13] Tendon-driven 4-Bar Yes 1/2
TBM hand [14] Tendon-driven Parallel Yes 1/2
Rutgers hand [38] Tendon-driven Serial No 3/0
The proposed Slider-crank Double 4-bar Yes 1/2

In other words, they express the postures represented from the glo-
bal coordinate X0 when every hi are zeros as shown in Fig. 3.
The chain rule is used to gure out the velocity relation be-
tween input and output. For notation ease, sinusoidal functions
are expressed as short form such as cx = coswx, sx = sinwx. On the
rst dyad of each link layer in Fig. 1, position of Ci for i = 1, 2, 3
can be calculated from both point A and B:

xiA liA ciA xiB liB ciB ; 4

yiA liA siA yiB liB siB ; 5
xiB  xiA d; 6
Fig. 2. Three revolute joints dyad example. yiB  yiA 0: 7

After differentiating Eqs. (4)(7) and rearranging them, we can get

Also the angle, a, is obtained as the following relations:
   " _ #
a tan1 V=U 2 x_ iB  x_ iA liA siA liB siB wiA
8
y_ iB  y_ iA liA ciA liB ciB w_ iB
where V yD0  yC 02 , U xD0  xC 02 . Angles from the global coordi-    " #
x_ iB  x_ iA 1 0 d_
nates in Fig. 2 are obtained as w2C 0 a b1 and 9
w2D0 a b2 because a is a negative value in Fig. 2. In the same y_ iB  y_ iA 0 1 0
way, every dyadic angle, wim, in Fig. 1 can be obtained for i = 1, 2,
Here, let us dene matrices as follows:
3 and m = A, B, D0 , D, G0 , G. The phalanx angle, h1, between line seg-
   
ments OB (it is the same as the global coordinate X0 in Fig. 1) and liA siA liB siB 1 0
BD, h2between BD and DG, h3between DG and GJ, are calculated by Gi1 and K i1
liA ciA liB ciB 0 1
using the dyadic angles as follows:
and if we rearrange Eqs. (8) and (9) about a dyad output, w_ iB , then
h1 w1B  0 w1B we have
" #
h2 w2D  0 w2D  h1 3 hh i i d_
w_ iB G1 K i1  for i 1; 2; 3 10
h3 w3G  0 w3G  h1  h2 i1
2; 0

where 0w1B, 0w2D, 0w3G denote the initial constant 1st, 2nd, 3rd- where 2; denotes the second row of corresponding matrix. From Eq.
phalanx joint angles represented from the global coordinate X0 in (3), we know that w_ 1B h_ 1 , w_ 2D h_ 1 h_ 2 , and w_ 3G h_ 1 h_ 2 h_ 3 ,
Fig. 1, respectively, when the phalanxes are completely extended. here h_ 1 is an angular velocity when i = 1 in Eq. (10). After applying

Fig. 3. Prototype of robotic index nger (its total mass is 80 [g] including linear actuator mass 19 [g]).
 G. Jang et al. / Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325 321

similar procedures, we can also get h_ 2 when j = 2 from the following Anchor
equation:
" #
hh i  i h_ 1
w_ jD G1
j3 K j3 for j 2; 3 11
2; _w 0
jD

where
" # " 0 #
ljE0 sjE0 ljD sjD l1 sh1 =2 ljD0 sjD0 Actuator
Gj3 and K j3 0
ljE0 cjE0 ljD cjD l1 ch1 =2 ljD0 cjD0 Prosthetic
Finger
We nally can get h_ 3 from the following equation:
" # Fig. 4. Conceptual design to connect the developed nger prosthesis to the end of
hh i i h_1 h_2
w_ 3G G1
35 K 35  ; 12 nger root bone.
2; w_ 3G0

where After subtracting above equations each other, we can get the length
  " 0
# of l2D0 as follow:
l3E0 s3E0 l3D s3D l2 sh12 =2 l3D0 s3D0
G35 and K 35 0 m 2
l3E0 c3E0 l3D c3D l2 ch12 =2 l3D0 c3D0 R  M R2
l2D0 18
2 M U  Mc
2D0 MV  2D0  m U  m c2D0  m V  m s2D0
Ms
Now, we know every phalanx angles and angular velocities.
Therefore the kinematic Jacobian for end-point J of stackable nger Also the remaining link length l2C 0 is automatically determined if the
mechanism can be obtained as if it is a serial-type planar manipu- link length l2D0 determined from Eq. (18) is applied to one of both
lator having three revolute joints: minimum and maximum equations. In other words, l2C0 is deter-
mined from Eq. (17). Link lengths of every nine dyads can be also
E_ J H
_; 13
determined in the same way. Fig. 3 shows a prototype of robotic n-
where ger prosthesis designed by the proposed method. The following sec-
 T  T tion discusses about how to connect the proposed prosthetic nger
E_ x_ J y_ J _ h_
and H 1 h_ 2 h_ 3 ; 14
mechanism to the living hand.
 
l1 sh1  l2 sh12  l3 sh123 l2 sh12  l3 sh123 l3 sh123
J 2.3. Idea about how to attach prosthetic nger to living hand
l1 ch1 l2 ch12 l3 ch123 l2 ch12 l3 ch123 l3 ch123
Till now, we have suggested the kinematics of prosthetic index n- For the index nger prosthesis development, we have gathered
ger. The following section discusses about how to design the link much information from medical doctors with rehabilitation major;
lengths. one of them is that many index nger-amputated persons have
revisited the hospital in order to remove the remaining nger parts
2.2. Link length design for dyads for cosmetic reason. Thus any anchor device can be attached to the
end of nger root bone when the medical doctors perform the
According to the Korean standard length and thickness of pha- removing operation of remaining nger. Ultimately the linear actu-
lanxes in [39], we are to determine the thickness and length of ator part will be located on the palm part connected to the nger
each phalanx in the robotic nger; in order words, the left side link root bone (metacarpal bone or carpal bone) as shown in Fig. 4. In
0 0 0 0 0 0
lengths of each 4-bar such as l2B0 , l2D0 , l3B0 , l3D0 , l3D and l3G0 in Fig. 1 are reality, when the linear actuator is attached, a few safety issues
determined from the standard thickness of phalanxes, also, the such as malfunction by external shock and implant material selec-
bottom link lengths such as l1, l2, and l3 are determined from the tion should be considered for clinical test later. The utilized linear
standard length of phalanxes in advance. And then the remaining actuator model is PQ-12 (manufactured by Figelli Technologies
link lengths of 4-bar linkages are determined from the range of Inc.). It has the following specications; maximum stroke: 20
motion of each joint. Let us consider one dyad as shown in [mm], maximum force: 18 [N] at 6 [mm/s], no-load speed: 12
Fig. 2; we can get the following relations: [mm/s], weight: 19 [g], dimension: 45  21.5  15 [mm], and max-
imum power consumption: 1.25 [W]. We hopefully presume that it
l2C0 c2C 0 xD0  xC 02 l2D0 c2D0 ; 15 might be inserted in the palm part without difculties. The follow-
l2C0 s2C 0 yD0  yC 02 l2D0 s2D0 ; 16 ing section suggests a real-time EMG signal processing method to
extract the desired nger motion from the muscle activations.
where c2C0 cos w2C 0 , s2C 0 sin w2C 0 , c2D0 cos w2D0 , and
s2D0 sin w2D0 . After squaring above two equations, respectively,
3. EMG signal processing and control
and adding them, we have
2 2
l2C0 R2 2l2D0 U  c2D0 V  s2D0 l2D0 : 17 Surface electromyography (sEMG) is measured from exor dig-
itorum supercialis (FDS) and extensor indicis (EI) in the lower
Now we apply the minimum and maximum values from the desired
arm with sEMG sensor. For this, sEMG sensor was developed using
range of motion m w2D0 6 w2D0 6 M w2D0 to above Eq. (17), respectively,
OP-AMPs (AD620 for separation of body ground from reference
as follows:
ground). Since it is known that EMG signal has a bandwidth of
2 2
l2C0 m R2 2l2D0 m U  m c2D0 m mV  m ms2D0 l2D0 whenw2D0 10 to 500 [Hz], the developed sEMG sensor has sequential func-
m tions such as 250 times amplication, bandpass ltering of 7.23
mw2D0
to 477 [Hz], one more 10 times amplication, and then 1.8 [V] level
2 M  2 shifting for analog-to-digital conversion. Also the developed EMG
l2C0 M R2 2l2D0 U  M c2D0 M V  M s2D0 l2D0 when w2D0 M w2D0 sensor has the following characteristics; two channels to acquire
exion and extension information of the index nger, small input
322 G. Jang et al. / Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325

[s] sampling time) are measured at rest. The threshold is set to

Effect of
flexion of
be a little bit larger than an average of M samples root mean
sEMG of index finger squared value (namely, an average of outputs from M samples
Flexor digitorum RMS window) as following form:
superficialis
" #12
at X X
N1 M1
2
Threshold p x n  k ; 19
Effect of N M n0 k0
Extension of
index finger
where x(n) implies the measured sEMG signal and at denotes a scal-
sEMG of ing factor for the threshold.
Extensor indicis
The thresholds obtained from the preprocessing are subtracted
from the RMS signals, and then all signals less than zero are elim-
inated as follow:
0 2 4 6 8 10
Time [s] EMGn r  dn  RMSn  Threshold; 20

where
Fig. 5. Comparison of sEMG signals measured from exor digitorum supercialis
(FDS) and extensor indicis (EI) muscles while an index nger is exing and
1; RMSn > Threshold
extending repeatedly. dn
0; else
phPM1 i1=2
2
p in which RMSn 1= M k0 x n  k ; dn is a switching
voltage noise; 9 [nV= Hz] at 1 [kHz], dimension: 57  39 [mm], function to eliminate the signal less than the given threshold, and
and input voltage: 3.3 [V]. r is a scaling factor to adjust intensity of signal because the inten-
The acquired sEMG signal can be divided into an initial burst sity of EMG signal becomes different according to subjects and sen-
part generated before and during actual motion and a long plateau sor locations attached to FDS and EI muscles, in the Fig. 6, rf for FDS
part appeared during no-motion. From anatomical references in and re for EI.
[40,41], it is known that FDS and EI muscles have charge of exion As a next step of main processing in Fig. 6, since the FDS muscle
and extension motions of index nger, respectively. As a matter of acts as exor of index nger and the EI muscle as extensor, we de-
fact, the motion intention is sequentially transferred and realized ne the synergistic EMG signal by subtracting the EI signal from
from the brain to the movement through the corresponding neural the FDS signal as follows:
and muscle activities, the time at which a human feels the urge to
move precedes the time of his/her actual movement by a few doz- EMGsyn n EMGf n  EMGe n 21
ens to hundreds milliseconds [42]. In other words, the initial burst where subscripts f and e denote FDS and EI muscles, respectively.
part of EMG precedes the onset of actual movement by dozens to Now we assume that the synergistic EMG signal of Eq. (21) has
hundreds milliseconds [43]. Thus, the initial burst part becomes some relation with velocity of nger movement by neglecting nger
more important to make the cooperative motion of prosthetic n- dynamics due to its negligible small mass. In other words, we as-
ger with living ngers. In this paper, the initial burst is utilized for sume that the synergistic EMG signal is proportional to the input
desired nger motion generation and the long plateau is removed velocity of the linear actuator. For practical use, we introduce the
by introducing the threshold. saturation function to limit both maximum forward and backward
Fig. 5 shows raw sEMG acquired by using the developed sensor speeds of the linear actuator. It is expressed as
while an index nger is repetitively exing and extending. The 8
measured sEMG signals are processed every 2 millisecond using < V max ;
> EMGsyn n > V max
the method suggested in Fig. 6. Aforementioned we rst measure d_ des n V min ; EMGsyn n < V min 22
sEMG signals at rest for 4 [s] and then we set the threshold values >
:
EMGsyn n; else
to remove the long plateau parts of sEMG. This is referred to as pre-
processing in this paper. For a preprocessing in the Fig. 6, N sam- where Vmax and Vmin denote maximum forward and backward
ples (here, N = 2000 because it is measured for 4 [s] with 0.002 speeds of the linear actuator, respectively.

Fig. 6. Block diagram of sEMG signal processing.

 G. Jang et al. / Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325 323

Fig. 7. Block diagram of entire control scheme, where dr is the actual displacement of the linear actuator.

A RMS Signal of FDS B

0.03 0.02
Threshold
0.02
0.01
0.01
0
0 2 4 6 0 2 4 6
Time [s] Time [s]

RMS Signal of EI
0.02
0.03
0.02 Threshold 0.01
0.01
0 0
0 2 4 6 0 2 4 6
Time [s] Time [s]

C The synergetic EMG signal D

0.03

0.02 0.02

0.01 0.01
0 0
-0.01
-0.01
-0.02
-0.02
0 2 4 6 0 2 4 6
Time [s] Time [s]

E
Actual
Displacement [mm]

8 Desired

2
1 2 3 4 5 6
Time [s]

Fig. 8. Experimental results; A. nding the thresholds of FDS and EI (Eq. (19)), B. obtaining the initial burst part of FDS and EI (Eq. (20)), C. synergistic EMG (Eq. (21)), D.
desired velocity of linear actuator (Eq. (22)), E. control performance; where desired displacement is obtained by Eq. (23) and actual displacement is measured from the built-
in potentiometer.

The desired displacement of the linear actuator is obtained ment is also constrained to the range of motion of linear
by integrating the desired velocity such as ddes n actuator dmin 6 d 6 dmax, we modify the desired displacement as
ddes n  1 T  d_ des n with sampling time T. Since above displace- follows:
324 G. Jang et al. / Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325

2 shown in Fig. 8.A, two threshold values were determined as

1+2+3 0.013 for FDS and 0.008 for EI, respectively. Third two scaling
+ factors rf = 0.9 for exion and re = 0.7 for extension were used
1 2

in Eq. (20) to extract the initial burst part appeared during in-
1
motion. The Fig. 8.B shows the initial burst parts of FDS and EI
1.5
obtained by applying Eq. (20), respectively. Fourth the synergis-
Angle [rad]

1 The Fig. 8D shows the result obtained by applying Eq. (22). Sixth
0.5
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Time [s]
Fig. 9. Actual 3-phalax motions resolved by using the kinematic resolution method
in Section 3.
8 In other words, since the sampling time is 0.002 [s], the pro-
< dmax ;
> ddes n > dmax
ddes n dmin ; ddes n < dmin
>
: The Fig. 8 shows the sequential graphs obtained by applying Eq.
ddes n; else
where dmax and dmin denote maximum and minimum displacement
of the linear actuator, respectively.
Till now we have obtained the desired displacement ddes(n)
through the real-time EMG signal processing procedures suggested
in Fig. 6. On the other hand, actual displacement is measured by
built-in potentiometer of linear actuator. The conventional PID
controller is applied to the error between desired and actual dis-
placements. A dead zone caused by friction, however, exists in real
actuator system. To remove the dead zone, the following compen-
sation is used:
V u a  signu
where u is the output of PID controller, a is the dead-zone constant
and V denotes control input for linear actuator. Finally Fig. 7 shows
an entire control scheme for the prosthetic index nger. The follow-
ing section suggests the experimental results to verify the effective-
ness of the proposed method.
4. Experimental result
Now we are to suggest the experimental parameters required
to implement the proposed algorithm in the Section 3. First the
sampling time is set as T = 0.002 [s] for acquiring both the sEMG
signals (sEMGf and sEMGe) and actual displacement of the linear
actuator (dr). Second N = 2000 (for sEMG 4 [s] data), M = 25 (for
RMS operation) and at = 1.005 (as a scaling factor) are used to
determine the threshold values as suggested in Eq. (19). As
tic EMG is obtained by using Eq. (21) as shown in Fig. 8C. Fifth
the forward and backward speeds of the linear actuator are lim-
ited by using Vmax = 0.02 [m/s] and Vmin = 0.02 [m/s] in Eq. (22).
the maximum and minimum displacement of the linear actuator
are also limited by setting dmax = 0.009 [m] and dmin = 0.0025 [m]
in Eq. (23). The solid line of Fig. 8E shows the desired displace-
ment of the linear actuator obtained by applying Eq. (23). Final-
ly, the performance of the tracking controller suggested in the
Fig. 7 is shown in the Fig. 8E. We can know that the actual dis-
placement tracks the desired one well in spite of the disadvan-
tage of the dead-zone effect in the linear actuator. Also we
should notice that the total time delay for the proposed real-
time signal processing is M samples (M = 25 for RMS operation).
posed algorithm has 0.05 [s] time delay during the real-time
23 processing.
(20)(24) to the measured sEMG signals. In addition, the actual
displacement can be resolved into 3-phalanx motion by using the
kinematic resolution method in the Section 2. A as shown in
Fig. 9. Also, Fig. 10 shows a few snapshots of experimental video
clip.
5. Conclusion and future works
The mechanism for robotic index nger prosthesis was pro-
posed by using stackable double 4-bar mechanisms and the sli-
der crank mechanism. The proposed mechanism has several
24 advantages; rst electrical components such as actuator and sen-
sor could be separated from mechanical components; second it
could be fabricated structurally strong by stacking the 4-bar
mechanism; third it could be designed to be implanted in the
living hand. In the case of nger, since its mass is very small,
the initial burst part of corresponding sEMG becomes more dom-
inant than the long plateau part affected by gravity while an in-
dex nger is moving. Thus, we have introduced the threshold
operation in the proposed EMG signal processing, ultimately, to
produce the desired velocity/displacement of the linear actuator.
Finally, we have shown the effectiveness of the entire control
scheme including the signal processing method through experi-
ments. Still we have many future works; rst robustness
improvement of EMG signal processing against noises, second
portability improvement by miniaturizing the sensor and the sig-
nal-processing modules, and third clinical test for prosthesis
approval.

Fig. 10. Snapshots of experiment movie clip.

 G. Jang et al. / Mechatronics 23 (2013) 318325
Acknowledgements
This work was supported in part by the Global Frontier R&D
Program on Human-centered Interaction for Coexistence funded
by the National Research Foundation of Korea grant funded by the
Korean Government (MEST) (2012M3A6A305), in part by the Min-
istry of Knowledge Economy (MKE) and Korea Institute for
Advancement in Technology (KIAT) through the Workforce Devel-
opment Program in Strategic Technology, and in part by the MKE
under the Human Resources Development Program for Conver-
gence Robot Specialists support program supervised by the NIPA
(National IT Industry Promotion Agency) (NIPA-2012-H1502-12-
1002), Republic of Korea.
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