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Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) provides global and regional information about ventilation by means of relative changes in electrical impedance measured with electrodes placed around the thorax. In combination with lung function tests, e.g. spirometry and body plethysmography, regional information about lung ventilation can be achieved. Impedance changes strictly correlate with lung volume during tidal breathing and mechanical ventilation. Initial studies presumed a correlation also during forced expiration maneuvers. To quantify the validity of this correlation in extreme lung volume changes during forced breathing, a measurement system was set up and applied on seven lung-healthy volunteers. Simultaneous measurements of changes in lung volume using EIT imaging and pneumotachography were obtained with different breathing patterns. Data was divided into a synchronizing phase (spontaneous breathing) and a test phase (maximum effort breathing and forced maneuvers). The EIT impedance changes correlate strictly with spirometric data during slow breathing with increasing and maximum effort ([Formula: see text]) and during forced expiration maneuvers ([Formula: see text]). Strong correlations in spirometric volume parameters [Formula: see text] ([Formula: see text]), [Formula: see text]/FVC ([Formula: see text]), and flow parameters PEF, [Formula: see text], [Formula: see text], [Formula: see text] ([Formula: see text]) were observed. According to the linearity during forced expiration maneuvers, EIT can be used during pulmonary function testing in combination with spirometry for visualisation of regional lung ventilation.

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The robot-assisted therapy has been demonstrated to be effective in the improvements of limb function and even activities of daily living for patients after stroke. This paper presents an interactive upper-limb rehabilitation robot with a parallel mechanism and an isometric screen embedded in the platform to display trajectories. In the dynamic modeling for impedance control, the effects of friction and inertia are reduced by introducing the principle of virtual work and derivative of Jacobian matrix. To achieve the assist-as-needed impedance control for arbitrary trajectories, the strategy based on orthogonal deviations is proposed. Simulations and experiments were performed to validate the dynamic modeling and impedance control. Besides, to investigate the influence of the impedance in practice, a subject participated in experiments and performed two types of movements with the robot, that is, rectilinear and circular movements, under four conditions, that is, with/without resistance or impedance, respectively. The results showed that the impedance and resistance affected both mean absolute error and standard deviation of movements and also demonstrated the significant differences between movements with/without impedance and resistance (p < 0.001). Furthermore, the error patterns were discussed, which suggested that the impedance environment was capable of alleviating movement deviations by compensating the synergetic inadequacy between the shoulder and elbow joints.

Three different discrete controllers were designed and tuned to be used in conjunction with a rotary blood pump during cardiopulmonary heart-lung support. The controllers were designed to operate in both steady and pulsatile modes. The system and methods were tested in a circulatory haemodynamic simulator. To guarantee stable control of the non-linear circulatory system in the presence of patient parameter uncertainties, a proportional plus integral (PI) and an H infinity controller were robustly tuned, using a non-linear time-varying model. (H infinity refers to the Hardy space, the set of bounded functions, analytic in the right half plane. The H infinity controller is the solution to the H infinity norm optimisation problem.) A self-tuning general predictive controller (GPC), together with an adaptive Kalman filter (KF) estimator, was compared with the two robustly tuned controllers. The closed-loop blood flow control circuit was set up in simulation routines first. The blood flow controllers were validated in a circulatory hydrodynamic simulator (MOCK) combined with a rotary blood pump. Parameters of the system simulator were changed continuously, and the controllers were tested over a wide range of different operating points. Disturbances in the form of discontinuous additive parameter uncertainties were applied. The closed-loop systems remained robustly stable. The robustly tuned H infinity controller showed the best control performance, in contrast to the GPC controller, which was near instability in regions of strongly varying non-linear system gain. Compared with the H infinity controller, the PI controller showed slightly worse behaviour, but the closed-loop response was acceptable, even in regions of strongly varying non-linear system gain and during pulsatile perfusion. The rotary blood pump could provide stationary and pulsatile perfusion under control conditions. Controlled variables were hereby mean blood flow, pulsatility index and heart rate. All three controllers were developed for an arterial mean flow of 0-6 l min(-1) and a heart rate of up to 70 beats per minute. Pulsatile closed-loop perfusion could provide up to 30 mmHg pressure variation in the simulated ascending aorta at a mean flow of 3 l min(-1).