Monday, November 18, 2013

Bionic Limb Technology: Megan Grozier


Imagine waking up in a hospital bed, and you reach for the glass of water on the nightstand, you scream in shock when you realize your arm, from the middle of your bicep down has been amputated. This can be the reality for many people that have unfortunately been in terrible accidents and other traumatic situations. Thankfully, doctors and others medical professionals have created a solution to help these people, this being bionic limbs.

How did we get this bionic technology? Well, we haven’t always had these robotic limbs. This technology has been around for thousands of years and improves constantly. When we started making these prosthetics they were made from heavy metal, usually iron, that was shaped into a hook, not only were these uncomfortable but they were not pleasing to the eye either. These prosthetics then transformed into more human like plastic limbs which were a little more comfortable but still had little to no useable functions. These we what people have mostly been using, and many people that suffer with limb loss have these typical plastic prosthetics. Just like anything in today’s world people are trying to and are improving things every day. Which has ultimately driven doctors to come up with mind controlled bionic limbs that would be light, comfortable and function better than the limbs that we were born with. Which in perspective work the same exact way that your normal limbs would, but with a bionic limb you could have more range when walking or for an arm you should make you wrist move three hundred and sixty degrees, where is something no human can do.
Although the idea of a mind controlled limb may seems farfetched and that it is ‘just something that you see in movies’ it’s not. This technology is the reality of hundreds of people that use this today. For example, in the video below there is a man named Zach Vawter. He is one of the first to test out and own this new bionic technology. I encourage you to watch this video below because of its link to a real life person and the explanation of how this exact technology works.

After watching that video I hope that you get the sense that what this technology is doing is not only extremely impressive but regular people use this every day to improve their lives.  Overall, this technology has made it a long way and I, along with many other people hope for this technology to continue to grow and expand to help people with traumatic limb loss. No matter what limb loss you suffered and who you are, the goal one day is to give everyone in need of a limb a mind controlled bionic.

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