Somatosensory restoration and neural control strategies in lower-limb prostheses

Dulce M Mariscal; Brendan Driscoll; He Huang; Lee E Fisher

doi:10.1038/s44385-025-00050-w

Somatosensory restoration and neural control strategies in lower-limb prostheses

NPJ Biomed Innov. 2025;2(1):44. doi: 10.1038/s44385-025-00050-w. Epub 2025 Dec 2.

Authors

Dulce M Mariscal^#^{1

2}, Brendan Driscoll^#³, He Huang^{4

5}, Lee E Fisher^{1

2

6

7

8}

Affiliations

¹ Rehab Neural Engineering Labs, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA USA.
² Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA USA.
³ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC USA.
⁴ UNC/NC State Lampe Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC USA.
⁵ UNC/NC State Lampe Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC USA.
⁶ Department of Bioengineering, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA USA.
⁷ Center for Neural Basis of Cognition, Pittsburgh, PA USA.
⁸ Department of Biomedical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA USA.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

People with lower-limb amputation cannot directly control or receive feedback from existing prostheses, but emerging technologies aim to address this gap. Some approaches focus on restoring somatosensation in the missing limb, while others record signals from residual muscles for prosthetic control. This review provides an overview of the current state of neuroprosthetics for somatosensory restoration and prosthetic control in lower-limb amputation, offering perspectives on integrating these technologies for bidirectional neuroprostheses.

Keywords: Brain-machine interface; Motor control.

Publication types

Review

Abstract

Publication types

Grants and funding