An Adaptive Block Backstepping Control Design for Functional Electrical Stimulation of Agonist-Antagonist Muscles

In this paper, an adaptive block backstepping controller is developed for stimulation of agonist-antagonist muscles by using Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES). FES is an alternative method that stimulates a paralyzed muscle in lieu of inactive motor neurons, which was first implemented in the 1960s ([1]). However, many challenges need to be addressed before clinical trials with Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) patients can be performed, which include designing a controller, modeling muscles, developing interface equipment, just to mention a few. To contribute to the FES control field, a nonlinear controller and its evaluation through a computer simulation are presented.