Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology designed a low-cost prosthetic knee that mimics normal walking motion. The MIT team's prototype generates a torque profile similar to that of able-bodied knees, using only simple mechanical elements like springs and dampers. The team is testing...

While powered lower limb prosthetics can greatly improve the mobility of amputees, errors in the technology can also cause users to stumble or fall, say researchers at North Carolina State University, Raleigh, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. They are examining what happens when these...

A body at sea is vulnerable to hypothermia, which often leads to loss of life. Hypothermia is caused by the differences between the core body temperature and the surrounding air and seawater temperatures. The greater the differences between the body core...