KAIST to Establish Robot Sports Competition for Lower Limb Paralysis Disabled Participants

Afternoon of the 22nd: Signing of Business Agreement with Korea Paralympic Committee

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Bong-su] A 'Paralympic-type sports competition' where domestic paraplegic disabled individuals wear wearable robots and compete in physical abilities will be established.

Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) signed a business agreement with the Korea Paralympic Committee on the afternoon of the 22nd at the Jeong Geun-mo Conference Hall at the Daejeon headquarters to promote disabled robot sports.

The two organizations agreed to collaborate on △ research and development of technologies applicable to disabled sports such as robotics, artificial intelligence, virtual reality (VR), and augmented reality (AR) △ discovering and promoting cooperative projects related to disabled sports technology △ developing strategies for establishing and operating disabled robot sports competitions. Additionally, they plan to cooperate on △ building and operating training facilities for acquiring and training robot sports technology △ nurturing operational personnel such as robot technicians and physical therapists △ collecting full-cycle big data on the process of disabled athletes acquiring robot sports skills.

In particular, the main cooperation goal is to develop robot technologies that can be applied diversely to disabled sports activities and, based on this, to establish a disabled robot sports competition.

When the level of technology development, the distribution status of wearable robots, and the achievements of robot sports competitions reach a certain stage, they plan to discuss participating in the annual National Paralympic Games to compete in skills.

The domestic robot sports field will adopt a form similar to the international standards and rules of the Swiss Cybathlon, which can be considered the origin of disabled robot competitions. The plan is to develop it into a Korean-style robot sport adapted to domestic conditions such as the regional and physical characteristics of disabled individuals.

Initially, the competition will be limited to the wearable robot category among the six events of the Cybathlon international competition (wearable robots, prosthetic arms, prosthetic legs, electric wheelchairs, electric stimulation bicycles, and brain waves).

Professor Gong Kyung-chul of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, who oversees the cooperative research, said, "Unlike most existing disabled sports activities that use wheelchairs, if a competition is held where paraplegic disabled individuals wear wearable robots and directly walk to perform various missions, it can provide athletes with experiences and meanings beyond sports activities," and added, "We will also seek active cooperation plans with other research and development institutions to practically apply more advanced technologies to the field of disabled sports."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.