A successful design

A Parkinson's patient might freeze in the middle of the street—or in a doorway en route to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Because Parkinson's attacks the area of the brain that controls muscle coordination, try as they might, patients can't resume walking without assistance.

Freshmen engineering design students invented a head cradle so a 16-year-old with cerebral palsy has constant access to his computer-communication switch. (12K JPG)

For its design project in Professor Willis Tompkins' Introduction to Engineering (EPD 160) class, a 13-student group developed a device that enables Parkinson's patients to "unfreeze" themselves.

Group members discovered that what often helps Parkinson's patients resume walking is having to step over an obstacle. The students also learned that Parkinson's patients respond well to "virtual" obstacles such as laser beams. With that in mind, they developed the Virtual Object Projection Apparatus. Easily affixed to and removed from a cane or walker, the device is an inexpensive laser pointer powered with lightweight AAA batteries and magnified with a lens. When the user depresses a thumb trigger, the laser-lens combination shines a highly visible 5-inch line—the obstacle—on the floor or ground.

The project held special meaning for group member Matt Bond, whose grandmother has Parkinson's disease. "It was a chance for us to give Parkinson's patients their freedom back," he says of the project. His grandmother will be the first to test the group's solution.