Immaculate prosthetic limb concept makes combines fun again
By Thomas Ricker 
posted February 10th 2009 6:33AM
posted February 10th 2009 6:33AM
We never thought it would it come to this, but damn if that image above doesn't make the idea of having a prosthetic limb attractive. A pang first felt at the sight of Oscar Pistorius' Cheetah prosthetics is now fully engorged with visions of reckless play around farm equipment. The concept "immaculate" from Hans Alexander Huseklepp explores the idea of turning a handicap into a high-performance, cybernetic fashion statement. The neurological prosthetic is clad in technology-packed corian plates with dome-joints that offer a larger degree of freedom than that motherly-issued arm of yours. So enough with the flesh-colored plastics already, this is the biomechatronic future of the proud naturoid we'd like to see. Hell, we have to do something now that tattoos and piercings have gone mainstream.
Sign me up please as long as that chick comes with the hand....
A prostetic arm isn't worth having unless it comes with a minigun or a flame thrower.
slap on a robo-gina and shes all mine
i hope you'll enjoy your prostetic handjob
That is a damn sexy dress...
You got it buddy.
I'd put my immaculate limb in her for some combined fun
frankly, the limb was the last thing i noticed
kinda hot....and kinda creepy.
Exactly my kind of girl
i have to puke
Agreed.
Although it looks pretty cool, the though of holding hands or a female touching me with a plastic or metallic hand seems way too unnerving at this point.
"Although it looks pretty cool, the though of holding hands or a female touching me with a plastic or metallic hand seems way too unnerving at this point."
So you're swearing off all women with prosthetics? There goes your last chance for a date.
@Bobby and Bryan:
The more I read your comments, the more your shallowness just shines. Nice.
Bring it on. Just wait until these things are as powerful as the Fullmetal Alchemist Automails :)
I'm hoping more for the future like Ghost in the Shell.
Hell, I'd atleast settle for Full Metal Panic...
Who had mechanical limbs in Full Metal Panic? Those were all big ass mobile suits. Or "Arm Slave" in that series I think.
Would the article have the same affect if the pictured prosthetic was attached to this lady? http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k118/FakeFrowns1985/ugly.jpg
I slept with her last week .. u know her ?
Hey Dude! What you doing with pictures of my mum?
Exactly my kind of girl
Is that Ron Perlman?!
Arm no... prosthetic head & face maybee....
...I think that's pretty cool actually.
but, can i move the damn limb?. if not then crap!.
Nice aesthetics, but how exactly is it meant to actuate? Human limbs, and all existing artificial replacements, work by leverage of some contracting or extending element (muscle, pneumatics, artificial muscle) around the joint. While I'm sure that you could come up with some sort of actuator that looks like the rendering, I dare say it would be much harder for the brain to "re-learn".
How does it attach to the actual body?
Glue?
Somehow, the massive set of leather straps wrapping around the body probably aren't that attractive...except to the S&M group, of course.
The brain is surprisingly versatile, you can connect a camera to electrodes on a person's tongue, and the brain can adapt to 'see' using the electrodes
http://discovermagazine.com/2003/jun/feattongue
I have no doubt that the brain could fairly easily adapt to drive a wide range of acutators in the arm. As for attaching it to the body, I'd imagine a socket could be implanted on the end of the arm for the machinary to connect to
They have been working neurological prosthetic limbs for years now. It even says something about neurological actuation in the blog.
"Nice aesthetics" is all it's for. It's a design concept, on a design blog.
There will be some compromises made (if this particular design goes anywhere) after the engineers take the impossibility of meeting all design parameters and having it look like that and pound it into the designers' thick skulls. (Designers may be modeled, with high accuracy, as Neanderthals of extreme artistic ability.)
Oh, and as an engineer, I wouldn't find "life-like" (i.e., uncanny valley) appearance, or even genuine life-like appearance, desirable characteristics. Nor would I find looking like this sleek monstrosity a desirable characteristic. I'd focus chiefly on performance and cost (to whatever extent I'm paying...), and inasmuch as looks mattered at all, I'd prefer more mechanical and less bio-robo-insect appearance. But, if I did get that one, it would _really_ need some nice Aperture tech instead of/in addition to that gripper; the style is just crying for it.
Engadget, you owe me one new Macbook keyboard. "limb concept makes combines fun again"
I like the idea in general. I mean, if people want to get their prosthetics looking close to the real thing that's great, but I'm sure there will be those that would like their prosthetics to stand out and maybe even make a fashion statement and I say, why not.
Did she lose her arm in a tragic Walk-Off accident? Those are dangerous...
Hey, I got a wacky idea. Whadda say we handle this on the runway....Han Solo.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0z28P4UL7Y
It looks shopped...
To Andir3.0
"It looks shopped..."
duh...
I can understand writing an article about a prosthetic that has a little bit of fashion to it but it is just plain insensitive to compare this to tattoos and piercings. I don't think many amputees would have willingly severed their arm so they could wear one of these.
I think you'd be surprised.
I'd gladly go for a fully robotic body if it came anywhere near half what's depicted in Ghost in the Shell right now. Then again I'm missing large portions of bone in my lower back, 4 disks, tons of bone spurs from top to bottom of my spine and chronic pain through out my entirre body. So parts replacement sounds nice to me. Pain meds can only do so much.
Look at the horrible meat sack that gorgeous arm is attached to!
"Underneath all this genius, I'm just a human .. you know, but I'm working on that!"
Ricker, you are a fucking idiot. To even suggest that one can lose a limb and it be cool, that's cold and stupid. As one whose grandfather lost a leg in a combine accident, and was so poor he had to make his own prosthesis (not kidding), I find your thoughts on the matter a load of it.
I know you're kidding, but young "sophisticates" like you really make me ill with how out of touch with reality you really are.
Oh, and another thing - it's not "neurological." That would be nerves. Idiot.
Harry D, I'm not poking for at those who wear prosthetics. I am, however, giving a poke to an industry that manufactures prosthetic limbs to mimic the look of their fleshy counterparts as if those who wear the substitute limbs should be ashamed of them. I say flaunt it, be proud, add some design and draw attention to it -- the technology inside these modern limbs is amazing.
That leads to making fun of those nonconforming conformists that tattoo and pierce the hell out themselves to prove how much of an individual they are. I'll bet that within the next 50 years (likely sooner), we'll see trendy prosthetics adopted by choice -- don't you read SciFi?
Thomas
@ Ricker:
I appreciate the explanation, but I seriously think you need to learn to self-edit. The wording of the article really does not lead one to think "tongue-in-cheek."
Even so, there are some things that are simply off-limits, and this is one of them. You'd never call a black a n*gg*r, just as you'd never say anything made the Holocaust look cool, but you sure as hell say what you said. Self-reflection is in order to discover what you find within bounds and without, and why.
This generation has boundary issues. You need to learn the rules of respect much better than you have. The device itself is interesting, but your article describing it is offensive.
Sorry Harry, but you're not the type I wish to engage in further online discussion. You're too busy with your keyboard courage to even understand (or Google) the neurological base of modern prosthetics. Catch ya on the next post.
Thomas
Wow. That might be the fastest I've seen Godwin's Law fulfilled in the Engadget comments. Nice work, Harry!
I also like your willingness to cast it all out there and call Ricker all sorts of names because you didn't get the joke. Which, granted, may be because you didn't see Johnny Mnemonic, for which I can't fault you. Still, maybe you should ask why something is supposed to be funny before you assume that the author is an insensitive tool who thinks amputation is funny.
You're not an idiot, but you do need to be aware that you (obviously) have an over-sensitivity here. We all want amputees to have the most capable prosthetic limbs possible. And the technology that is making that happen is very, very cool stuff. There is nothing wrong with saying that. Nor is it insensitive to say that a prosthetic is so next-generation that you kinda want one. It doesn't mean you really do (just like I kinda want that Swedish "personal jet" thing -- I don't REALLY, but I acknowledge that it is undeniably cool), and it certainly doesn't detract from the tragedy that produced someone else's need for one. It should, in fact, give some measure of hope and comfort to an amputee that they can be confident that their "new limb" won't freak people out, but will be something that they can wear with confidence in our techy society.
On the downside, said amputee will likely get tired of nerds peppering them with questions about how it works and whether it can crush steel.
@ricker: whatever you think of harry and his reaction to your story, he does have a valid point. you crossed a line, and you got called on it. if you want to avoid this kind of confrontation, the easiest way would be to think a bit harder next time. i wouldn't take solace in your reader approval, either: right and wrong aren't decided by majority vote, and certainly not when it's bullying those you've offended.
m, there's nothing justifying the being 'called out'. Only those without a sense of humor or intellect could realize that this website is hardly ever serious about anything. That includes prosthetics. Take your faux outrage to faux news.
wait since when did thomas sign his comments?
No Harry, you are the idiot. I've known people injured in accidents like this too. I've had a friend and a father of a friend lose a limb this way. I thought the title was hilarious, and for that, props to you Ricker.
This is the internet, learn to take a joke. People make jokes all the time about wars, cancer, sicknesses, and everything else. Get over yourself and learn to take a joke.