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Dependence on traditional assistance devices like canes and walkers are used to increase a patient’s
base of support, improve balance and increase activity and independence.

It is no secret that mobility can be a major challenge for people as they age. With that, dependence on traditional assistance devices like canes and walkers are used to increase a patient’s base of support, improve balance and increase activity and independence.

But what if there was an assistance device available that did all of that and more, including helping individuals raise and lower to a seated position? This is the question a senior design team within the College of Engineering and Engineering Technology (CEET) asked before creating a prototype for a robotic walker.

The team—made up of engineering students Joshua Keene and Kyle Matthews, who have since graduated— came together to design and build a prototype during the 2019-2020 school year, and when the global pandemic brought a halt to some of the in-class efforts, the work continued on until Fall 2022.

CEET Dean Donald Peterson is excited for this project’s potential.

“This powered, robotic walker represents the ability to provide someone with more independence than they normally have with a typical walker that exists, like one with a basket on it or one that someone gets coming out of rehab and they put tennis balls on the legs,” Peterson said. “This will provide the ability to move around without any power, just like those other walkers can, with nice smooth motions, but it also can provide power for mobility to move forward, backwards, turn. And, in addition, it can also help to lower and raise someone from a seated and to a seated posture. It will be able to go backwards and line someone up with a chair, and the individual can use the walker to help lower them to the chair. Or this unit can move up and help someone stand up from a chair and then move.”

The prototype was constructed out of aluminum, in order to be light-weight.

“We feel it’s unique. The technology to do this is not in itself novel, but bringing it together to make it happen is the novel and tactical aspect of it.”

Constructed out of aluminum, in order to be light-weight, the walker runs on rechargeable DeWalt Max 20V batteries while also containing a microcontroller board that allows for “Smart” programming. Various sensors are used to provide functionality including tilt detection, stair/ledge detection, and battery monitoring.

The focus of the original design was creating a high-functionality, low-weight and low-maintenance walker that would increase the freedom of movement of the user. It is compact enough to move through small doorways and aisles and can help a person in sitting and standing while also helping them to avoid any unseen obstacles or dangers.

Once the prototype was created, the team focused on their design presentation, including a detailed abstract and poster, which included detailed illustrations of the product. Then art student Erin Crawford ’20, was chosen to create the drawings for the team, and it was an experience she found very rewarding.

Erin Crawford was tasked with illustrating the use of the walker without showing any proprietary design or technology used.

“I got involved in the project when my professor told his classes about an opportunity to partner with an engineering team as an independent study,” she said. “I thought it would be good practice for me to start creating artwork for people outside of the art community, so I jumped on the opportunity. I was given a list of projects and told to select the ones of interest to me.”

Crawford chose the mobility walker not only because it was an interesting project but also because of the help it would potentially give people.

“Most of the illustrations I created were for a user manual. I also was tasked with creating an illustration for a blog that would express the idea of the design without giving away any intellectual information on the project, which was a really wonderful challenge,” she said.

The walker runs on rechargeable DeWalt Max 20V batteries while also containing a microcontroller board that allows for “Smart” programming.

Crawford noted that the experience has remained with her as she has graduated and continued her art career.

“(The project) wasn’t like any opportunity I’d had before, and it gave me a lot of insight for how to communicate with clients that haven’t much experience in the art world. It also really helped me learn to ask the right questions to provide the team the artwork they needed. It definitely opened my eyes to what a freelancing job may look like for me in the future,” she said.

Experiential learning is part of NIU’s promise to students who need real-world experience in order to be competitive in the job market. While engineering focuses on this type of hands-on training, many NIU programs rely on these real-world projects to teach skills to their students, including art students like Crawford.

Within CEET’s bachelor’s degree program, students form teams to take on a senior design challenge.

Various sensors are used to provide functionality including tilt detection,
stair/ledge detection, and battery monitoring.

These team projects involve creating or improving commercial products or industrial processes. To complete the project, students use classroom knowledge to integrate concepts, apply theories, and construct a prototype or process. Along the way, they are mentored by faculty and industry professionals. When finished, they present their projects at their Senior Design Day event. Since that time, the plans for the robotic walker have resided with the Division of Research and Innovation Partnerships, where it is being prepared for patent application.

Karinne Bredberg, director of the Office of Innovation, within the Division of Research and Innovation Partnerships, has high hopes for where this particular design will lead. While NIU has not filed a patent yet on the technology, it has decided to wait for a more advanced prototype before filing a patent application.

“The NIU Technology Transfer Office has been in discussions with a company who wants to take the original design and produce a prototype that would be easier to manufacture on a larger scale,” Bredberg said. “I believe that the project has great potential to help increase the mobility of individuals with disabilities, injuries or general aging if we can develop the manufacturing process and keep the cost of the device accessible for most users. The most likely outcome would be that NIU would license the technology to an established manufacturer who would then brand the product.”

Bredberg noted that this project highlights NIU’s engineering expertise and the types of interesting projects that come out of NIU and our Senior Design Project program.

“It is always exciting to see one of NIU’s technologies reach the market. The health care space, in particular, is significant (for NIU) as these products often have positive impacts in patient’s quality of life,” she said. “It is extremely satisfying for me, personally, to see projects like these fulfill the many facets of the NIU mission of providing benefits to our community through our research and student experiential learning opportunities. It is a point of pride to be a part of a university that has such strong values.”

Peterson said, “Every engineering student and engineer has the power and potential to become entrepreneurs. We are innovators. It’s the nature of the discipline in that we are in. And, so, this gives the opportunity for students to ideate, design, construct, test, debug, refine and get it to a point where it is a proof of concept and there is the opportunity to go after a patent.”

The senior design program is made possible by CEET’s clients and sponsors, who present our student teams with challenges faced by their organizations. Our students are learning the latest theories and technologies. They’ll bring an innovative approach to the creation or improvement of your product, system or process.

“There is a huge potential in each engineering student and giving them the hands-on opportunity to understand the power that they have to make significant changes in society but also significant changes in our economy,” said Peterson. “Most engineering students in our senior design program are working with high-end projects, either for a company or for a faculty in or outside of the college, the national laboratories, or even with the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab, also known as JPL, to develop technologies or systems, whatever those clients need. These are things that don’t exist, so we don’t see clients giving students projects that are just a recreation of something that already exists. These are really cutting-edge types of initiatives.”