Project MARCH is a TU Delft | Dream team of 26 students working on the development of an innovative exoskeleton. An exoskeleton is a robotic suit that provides support, enabling someone with a complete spinal cord injury to get up and walk again. Every year, new aspects are added to improve the quality and user-friendliness of the suit. The first five teams focused on the Cybathlon, an international competition in which people with disabilities compete against each other to overcome everyday obstacles.
This year, MARCH VII will build on this and focus mainly on dynamic walking and usability. The goal is to complete a walking route at the end of the academic year in which the walking pattern is continuously generated. This is achieved by scanning the environment with different depth cameras. The images from these cameras are then used to generate real-time walking patterns that adapt to the perceived environment. Furthermore, this year we will investigate the possibilities of controlling the exoskeleton using electroencephalography (EEG) instead of just the Input Device in the stool. This means that the exoskeleton can be controlled by the brain. By the end of this year, the goal is that the pilot (the driver of the suit) can start and stop walking just by thinking about it.