He (Helen) Huang

Helen’s research interest lies in science and technology that can establish and enhance a symbiotic relationship between humans and wearable assitive machines in order to augment motor function for individuals with disabilities. Her research goal is to create breakthroughs in human-machine symbiotic (HMS) systems that empower disabled people to lead more active and productive lives.

 

 

 

 

 

To achieve this overarching goal, her current research focuses on understanding how limb amputees and robotic prostheses interact with each other and their environments and development of advanced control for robotic prostheses, which are adaptive, efficient, and safe, in order to restore the motor function in individuals with limb amputations. Three research thrusts have been formulated in my lab:

Thrust 1: Investigation of neuromuscular control and sensorimotor integration in limb amputees and development of neural-machine interfaces for neural control of robotic prosthetic limbs

Thrust 2: Investigation of wearer-machine co-adaptation and development of optimal adaptive control for robotic prostheses that provide personalized assistance and can adapt to changes in wearers and environments.

Thrust 3: Investigation of error correction and tolerance in human-machine symbiotic (HMS) systems and development of fault tolerant control for robotic prosthetic legs to improve the wearer’s stability and safety

*For current projects and open opportunities, check our lab or CLEAR websites

Research Interests

Wearable robotics
Neural-machine interface
Robotic prosthetics and exoskeleton
Optimal adaptive control
Human-robot interaction

Publications

A novel approach to assess coordination in people with transtibial amputations using continuous and event relative phase
Mituniewicz, A. L., Nalam, V., & Huang, H. H. (2025), JOURNAL OF BIOMECHANICS, 181. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbiomech.2025.112522
Enhancing Robot Transparency in Human-Robot Prosthesis Interaction to Mitigate Terrain Misrecognition Error
Lee, I.-C., Liu, M., & Huang, H. (2025), IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON MEDICAL ROBOTICS AND BIONICS, 7(2), 734–742. https://doi.org/10.1109/TMRB.2025.3552924
A novel approach for predicting usability of upper limb prostheses
Park, J., Zahabi, M., Huang, H., & Benden, M. (2024), APPLIED ERGONOMICS, 120. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apergo.2024.104344
An Efficient Framework for Personalizing EMG-Driven Musculoskeletal Models Based on Reinforcement Learning
Berman, J., Lee, I.-C., Yin, J., & Huang, H. (2024), IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON NEURAL SYSTEMS AND REHABILITATION ENGINEERING, 32, 4174–4185. https://doi.org/10.1109/TNSRE.2024.3483150
Assisting Upper Limb Prosthesis with a Computer Vision System for Material Detection
Roper-Bryant, D., Berman, J., & Huang, H. H. (2024), 2024 46th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBC). https://doi.org/10.1109/embc53108.2024.10782550
Continuous Gait Phase Estimation from Translational Kinematics: Towards Implementation in Powered Ankle Prostheses
Mituniewicz, A. L., Hone, W., Lewek, M. D., & Huang, H. (2024), 2024 10TH IEEE RAS/EMBS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE FOR BIOMEDICAL ROBOTICS AND BIOMECHATRONICS, BIOROB 2024, pp. 1843–1848. https://doi.org/10.1109/BIOROB60516.2024.10719818
Enhancing User-Prosthesis Integration through Intelligent Transparency
Lee, I.-C., Liu, M., & Huang, H. (2024), 2024 10TH IEEE RAS/EMBS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE FOR BIOMEDICAL ROBOTICS AND BIOMECHATRONICS, BIOROB 2024, pp. 471–476. https://doi.org/10.1109/biorob60516.2024.10719813
Human factors considerations of Interaction between wearers and intelligent lower-limb prostheses: a prospective discussion
Bai, X., Yuan, J., Liu, M., Huang, H., & Feng, J. (2024). [Review of , ]. JOURNAL OF NEUROENGINEERING AND REHABILITATION, 21(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12984-024-01475-x
Human-Centered Evaluation of EMG-Based Upper-Limb Prosthetic Control Modes
Liu, Y., Berman, J., Dodson, A., Park, J., Zahabi, M., Huang, H., … Kaber, D. B. (2024, April 11), IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON HUMAN-MACHINE SYSTEMS, Vol. 4. https://doi.org/10.1109/thms.2024.3381094
Integrating Upper-Limb Prostheses with the Human Body: Technology Advances, Readiness, and Roles in Human-Prosthesis Interaction
Huang, H., Hargrove, L. J., Ortiz-Catalan, M., & Sensinger, J. W. (2024). [Review of , ]. ANNUAL REVIEW OF BIOMEDICAL ENGINEERING, 26, 503–528. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-bioeng-110222-095816

View all publications via NC State Libraries

He (Helen) Huang