Japan is a technologically rich country and has employed industrial robots for the longest time. A robotic suit that will, in future assist the elderly and the disabled to stand and move around has been developed by Japanese robot-maker Cyberdene. It has now received a global safety certificate.
HAL, short for Hybrid Assistive Limb, is a pair of robotic legs that can be attached to the legs of a disabled or aged person. It will help them move around like a normal person. The artificial limb was not the first artificial limb made by Cyberdene. The company has made robotic arms in the past, too.
This opens up a whole new world of opportunities for disabled people to move around freely. For now it will be used to help patients rehabilitate from nerve and muscle illnesses. The robot suit HAL will be used by ten hospitals in the first clinical trials of it's kind.
Cyberdene is based in Tsukuba, northeast of Tokyo and has rented out approximately 330 suits to about 150 hospitals and welfare organisations. To clarify, Cyberdene is not to be confused with the firm of the same name in the movie ‘Terminator’ and HAL is not related to the evil supercomputer from Stanley Kubric’s ‘2001:A Space Odyssey’ either.
