SuitX, a company spun off from UC Berkeley’s Robotics and Human Engineering Laboratory, unveils the Phoenix robotic exoskeleton.

The robotics lab is a team of graduate students led by mechanical engineering professor Homayoon Kazerooni, also the founder and CEO of SuitX.

According to a media release from University of California at Berkeley, the Phoenix—featuring original technology developed by the Kaz laboratory—is lightweight, has two motors at the hips, and electrically controlled tension settings that tighten when the wearer is standing and swing freely when they’re walking. Users can control the movement of each leg and walk up to 1.1 miles per hour by pushing buttons integrated into a pair of crutches. It’s powered for up to 8 hours by a battery pack worn in a backpack.

The Phoenix can also be adjusted to fit various weights, heights, and leg sizes, and can be used for a range of mobility hindrances, per the release.

“We can’t really fix their disease,” Kazerooni says in the release. “We can’t fix their injury. But what it would do is postpone the secondary injuries due to sitting. It gives a better quality of life.”

A writeup about SuitX’s Phoenix exoskeleton was published recently in MIT Technology Review.

[Source(s): University of California at Berkeley, Science Daily]