The RoboGlove project is a robotic glove by students at the Université Libre de Bruxelles that is designed to assist the wearer when continuously gripping objects.

This is accomplished by a series of three servos that transmit force through cables for the index finger, middle finger, and thumb. Control is via an Arduino Uno, which takes input from pressure sensors in the three finger fixtures, helping the wearer keep gripping when force is initially exerted to close a fist.

The glove has a wire connection that links the fingers to some servo motors: a wire is attached to the extremity of the finger and to the servo, so when the servo turns, the wire is pulled and the finger is flexed. In this way, by controlling the grip done by the user through some pressure sensors in the extremity of the fingers, we are able to actuate the motors in a controlled way and help the gripping by bending the finger proportionally to the rotation of the motors and so to the rolling up of the wires. In this way we should be able either to allow weak people to grip objects or help even people in physiological conditions to grip objects and to keep it without any effort.

While still a prototype, it’s an interesting device that could be developed further into a very helpful augmentation. You can see it in action below!