User-driven treadmill using walking speed estimated from plantar pressure sensor

Abstract

A user-driven treadmill is a walking platform that is put into motion by the action of a user. The estimation of walking speed plays an important role in controlling the treadmill, especially the ones with a small walking area. Plantar pressure potentially has a significant relationship with walking speed. A new walking speed estimation and treadmill control algorithm using plantar data, which is measured using wearable insole pressure sensors is proposed. After capturing the best pressure parameters and developing an appropriate feedforward control scheme, the user experiment and analysis results are analysed to verify the performance and effectiveness of the proposed method.