Paralysed man learns to feel again through new robot hand

A MAN left paralysed by a car crash has been able to feel again through a robotic arm.

Nathan Copeland, 28, snapped his neck and damaged his spinal cord in 2004, leaving him quadriplegic from the chest down and unable to move or feel his lower arms and legs.

But he has now become the first person who has felt anything beyond a faint tingling when using a robot hand.

Mr Copeland was a teenager when he was paralysed and left unable to move his hands, which are permanently curled up into fists. The robot arm is not connected to his body, but is linked to him through computer chips implanted in part of his brain which controls touch.

The American said: ‘i can feel just about every finger [in the robot arm] – it’s a really weird sensation. Sometimes it feels electri- cal and sometimes it’s pressure, but for the most part i can tell most of the fingers with definite precision.’

The quadriplegic’s case has now been published in the journal Science Translational Medicine and is seen as an important step forward in robotics.

Four years ago, the same team at the University of Pennsylvania and University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre, were able to use their ‘brain computer interface’ to help quadriplegic Jan Scheuermann feed herself chocolate by using her mind to control a robotic arm. But there was no sense of touch to tell the hand how tightly to grip an object.

This was the goal of the latest study, where imaging scans were used to find the exact regions of Mr Copeland’s brain corresponding to the movement and feelings in each of his fingers and palm. Four micro-electrodes half the size of shirt buttons were implanted to provide a link to the robot arm.

Andrew Schwartz, professor of neurobiology at the University of Pittsburgh, said: ‘There is still a lot of research that needs to be carried out to better understand the stimulation patterns needed to help patients make better movements.’