BIOE Seminar Series: Jackson Family Distinguished Professor He (Helen) Huang

Towards Human-Prosthesis Symbiosis

Abstract: As the number of individuals living with limb loss in the United States reaches millions, there is an urgent need for advanced prosthetic technologies that can provide this large population with the best restoration of normal function possible. While commercially available robotic prostheses, such as dexterous prosthetic hands and motorized prosthetic legs, have become commercially available, their adoption and functional capabilities remain limited. 

This presentation highlights our research aimed at building a symbiotic relationship between humans and robotic prostheses, i.e., the prosthesis controller and the wearer’s motor control system coordinate and adapt to function as a seamless, unified entity. We investigate human-prosthesis interactions and develop learning-based control and neural-machine interfaces to enable prosthesis adaptation to its amputee users (physically and cognitively) and task contexts. Our innovative approaches may further advance the function of modern, intelligent prostheses and significantly improve the quality of life for individuals with limb amputations.

Biography: Dr. He (Helen) Huang is the Jackson Family Distinguished Professor in the Lampe Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering at North Carolina State University (NC State) and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC), the Director of the Closed-Loop Engineering for Advanced Rehabilitation (CLEAR) core, and the launch director for NC State Robotics Initiative. Her research interests lie in neural-machine interfaces, rehabilitation and assistive technology (robotic prosthetics and exoskeletons), learning-based wearable robot control, wearer-robot interaction and co-adaptation, and human motor control/biomechanics. She was a recipient of the Delsys Prize for Innovation in Electromyography, NIDILRR Switzer Fellowship, NSF CAREER Award, ASA Statistics in Physical Engineering Sciences Award, and NC State ALCOA Foundation Distinguished Engineering Research Award. She is a Fellow of AIMBE, Fellow of IEEE, and NC State faculty scholar. She is currently the Editor-in-Chief for the IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering and an Editorial Board Member for the IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering.