Exoskeleton




 * 2006 April 6 - In 2006 Kyoga Ide, a 16-year old with muscular dystrophy, will climb 260 meters on a Breithorn mountain using a HAL exoskeleton.
 * 2006 October 24 - The US military have comissioned Sarcos to build an exoskeleton that will give soldiers considerable extra strength and run for over 24 hours. New Scientist give an update on this project, which has been in development since at least 2001.  The device is an extension of hydraulic robotics.  A combustion engine presurises the working fluid which is piped to the individual joints.  "I wore a 100-pound weight on my back and it felt I was carrying nothing like that amount".
 * 2007 April 20 - We reported on the Japanese HAL-5 exoskeleton in October as a way to assist disabled peoples in recovering their original strength. The exo-skel could also be used by "normal" people such as doctors and nurses to increase their strength for conquering the earth doing heavy lifting. Well, seems like some price-points and release dates are floating around. One should be able to lease the HAL-5 in Japan for 70,000 yen ($590) a month starting in 2008.

Links

 * http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/oct05/1901 - a good overview of present-day situation
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powered_exoskeleton