Impedance control applications in therapeutic exercise robots

Abstract The use of robots in physical therapy and rehabilitation is increasing day by day. The contributions of robotic rehabilitation have been proven by clinical trials. Impedance control is the most known and used control method in rehabilitation robots. The purpose of the impedance control is to balance mechanical impedance of the end effector of the robot. Authors have developed three impedance-controlled therapeutic exercise robots until now, such as PHYSIOTHERABOT©, PHYSIOTHERABOT/w1©, and DIAGNOBOT©. In these systems, various versions of impedance control have been used such as position-based, force-based, variable, and hybrid impedance control. Therapeutic exercises have been modeled using these impedance control techniques. In this chapter, the fundamental concepts of impedance control are explained. Then application of them in the above-mentioned robotic systems is introduced.