Handicap: a 3D printed bionic glove

The innovations of 3D printing continue to multiply! A team of 23 students from ISEN, an engineering school in Lille specializing in electronics and digital technology, created a printable bionic glove that can make a paralyzed hand move again.

Print’Hand is the name of the end of study project of this group of engineering students. To help them in their project, the students collaborated with DAGOMA, a Roubaix company specializing in the creation and provision of 3D printers for the general public. Together, they created an exoskeleton for people who have lost partial or total use of their hand, or forearm. The specificity of the object that it is 3D printable and put in open source. This means that the plans are open access, allowing anyone to rework and modify them.

A multi-use glove

The bionic glove has two operating modes, it allows its user to either do rehabilitation exercises with predefined movements, or to grasp objects in everyday life. To create the exoskeleton, the students used a glove attached to a 3D printed frame. The user must also wear a cuff at the level of the biceps to be able to capture the various movements of the muscle and then redirect them towards the forearm. The device can be controlled via bluetooth, thanks to a mobile application downloadable on smartphone.

Technology versus aesthetics

Before finalizing their project, the students had to solve several problems. Their first constraint was to combine both technology and aesthetics. The engineers therefore worked on the miniaturization of the components so that the object was not too large and above all easy to use. The second mainly concerned the strength of the exoskeleton and its sensitivity. In view of a commercial version, the bionic glove has to adapt to all kinds of problems like holding a heavy object but also gripping sensitive objects like an egg.

Some students decided to continue the adventure, to create their business and sell the now fully functional bionic glove.