Tuesday, November 27, 2007

New Prosthetics Let Patients Reach Out and Touch Stuff [Prosthetics]

Prosthetic.jpgResearchers at Northwestern University have developed a way to make people with prosthetic limbs feel by transplanting nerves from the amputated hand into the patient's chest. Though the feeling would be in the chest rather than their arms, the scientists are hopeful that this could lead to prosthetics with sensors under the fingertips which would make people feel like they had a real hand. The only feedback that patients with the traditional prosthetics currently available get is visual, which leads to many broken glasses they can't determine the force of their grip. Keep your fingers crossed that these bionic arms take off so that people with prosthetics will never have to fear about dropping their beer ever again. [Technology Review]








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