Fuzzy CMAC-Based Adaptive Scale Force Control of Body Weight Support Exoskeletons

The body weight support method of exoskeletons is useful for the rehabilitation of patients with lower limb dyskinesia and performance augmentation of elders. Rather than enhancing the human joint strength directly, the body weight support exoskeleton provides assistance by supporting part of the human body weight and thus releasing the burden experienced by human legs. This paper proposes a two-level hierarchical control method aiming to achieve task-free and strong system robustness. A scale force control method, which can be simply described as making the supporting force of the robot several times the magnitude of a human leg, is developed as the high-level controller. The low-level controller is designed as a fuzzy cerebellar model articulation controller (CMAC)-based adaptive control to enhance the system robustness. The proposed method is applied to a squat movement and a single leg stance movement and is simulated in a combined simulation environment. The results show that the exoskeleton can always provide improved support according to the foot reaction force that is controlled by the user and that the system handles model errors and external disturbances well.