PhD defence Lucas Norman Dahl

Keywords: Wearable assistive devices, Anthropomimetic test device, Instrumented assessment, Human–device interaction

"Instrumented Anthropomimetic Test Device for Systematic Evaluation of Upper-limbwearables"

This thesis investigated how wearable assistive devices, such as orthoses and exoskeletons, can be tested more safely, consistently, and systematically. Current evaluations often depend on human participants, which makes results difficult to compare and can expose people to unnecessary risks during early-stage testing. Therefore, an artificial test arm was developed to approximate important features of the human upper limb, including bones, soft tissues, joint movement, and muscle-related shape changes. Built-in pressure sensors enable the device to measure how forces are transferred between a wearable device and the artificial arm. A camera-based method was also developed to compare the deformation of the artificial soft tissues with that observed in a human arm. In experiments with an upper-arm orthosis, the test device detected changes in pressure distribution and orthosis misalignment. The work provides a test platform for reproducible evaluation that can support the development and comparison of wearable assistive devices before extensive testing with human participants.

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