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Three biomedical engineering students have grown a passion project into an award-winning mission-driven innovation. Ben Broyles, Elissa Cimino and Aidan Scott-Van Deusen collaborated to create SimuStride, an augmented reality rehabilitation system designed to help amputees regain mobility and combat phantom limb pain.
Team member Ben Broyles recalled the origins of SimuStride and reflected on how the project came to be.
“SimuStride began when we recognized a gap in the recovery process for lower-limb amputees. After surgery, patients often wait months before receiving a prosthetic leg, which can lead to phantom limb pain and the loss of key motor skills. While early prosthesis training has been shown to help, it is not accessible to most amputees due to both manufacturing limitations and physiological barriers,” Ben explained.
“We wanted to bridge that gap and give patients a greater sense of control over their rehabilitation. This led us to develop SimuStride, an augmented reality rehabilitation system that allows amputees to begin practicing prosthetic movement just days after surgery instead of months.”
During the average 10-month wait a patient usually has for a prosthesis, they are likely to experience a loss of motor function in addition to phantom limb pain. While current treatments can alleviate symptoms, they aren’t able to address how delaying the prosthesis causes these complications in the first place. So, how exactly does SimuStride work?
Using augmented reality, virtual elements are superimposed into the user’s physical environment, where they will see a virtual prosthesis attached to their residual limb. They can control the movement of their virtual leg based on real-time muscle activity captured by an electromyography sleeve. Combined with traditional non-weight-bearing exercises, SimuStride can offer a new level of both physical and neural therapy.
Ultimately, the early, engaging and immersive prosthesis visualization and training leads to greater control and independence, empowering amputees and vastly improving their quality of life.
SimuStride is a product of USTAAR, a University of Miami initiative supported by the Alvarez Fund that provides financial and resource support for student design projects, technology transfer and the commercialization of startup companies. Under the leadership of Suhrud Rajguru, professor of biomedical engineering and otolaryngology and assistant vice provost for research workforce development, the program aims to cultivate innovation and promote entrepreneurship among students. Recently, SimuStride was awarded $100,000 through the USTAAR competition, further accelerating its mission to transform prosthetic rehabilitation with augmented reality.
This latest accolade isn’t the first time SimuStride has been recognized. Last year, the team won a $30,000 grant as part of the College of Engineering’s Rothberg Catalyzer Pitch Competition. On a campus full of students with bold ideas, many don’t have the resources to bring those ideas to life, Aidan shared how student competitions, along with the University’s own programs like USTAAR, empower students to explore their entrepreneurial side in ways that can’t be taught in a classroom.
On April 2, the student entrepreneurs represented the College of Engineering and the University of Miami at the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) InVenture Prize, an innovation competition where teams of undergraduates representing each ACC university pitch their inventions or businesses to a live audience and a panel of judges. The University of Miami team won the top honor, as well as $30,000 in prizes.
“Competitions like the ACC InVenture Prize are instrumental in driving and supporting innovation among students. If not for the 2024 Rothberg Catalyzer Pitch Competition, we would not have come up with our idea for SimuStride until much later on, if at all,” Aidan said. “These competitions provide students with invaluable motivation and opportunities to share their ideas and gain funding for their projects.”
Elissa echoed the value competitions bring to enterprising students. “Through these competitions, we secured the funding that allowed us to file a patent, complete product development and prepare for a pilot study with amputees,” she said.
“We’ve also had the privilege of forming relationships with clinicians in the Miami area who have helped us bring SimuStride into clinics to begin testing with amputees. We are excited to continue growing SimuStride so it can make a real impact in amputee rehabilitation.”
Opportunities to share their work on a larger stage have proven to be a game-changer for the team and, potentially, for the more than 700,000 people in the United States living with above-knee amputations. They are looking toward the future and where they hope it will take SimuStride.
“Our goal is to enhance the quality of life for amputees around the world by giving them greater confidence and control over their rehabilitation journey. Looking ahead, we hope to see SimuStride integrated into rehabilitation centers, VA hospitals, and eventually at-home therapy programs to transform the way people recover from limb loss,” Ben said.
