Medicine and the Body
Artificial arms, hands, legs and feet through the centuries.
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A plain-language history of artificial limbs, from ancient wood, leather and bronze to modern carbon-fiber, microprocessor-controlled and custom-fitted devices.
The early history of brain-computer interfaces, from Hans Berger's first human EEG to 1970s proposals and 1990s experiments that moved cursors with brain signals.
How sensors and microprocessors entered artificial limbs, from hydraulic knees to computer-controlled knees of the 1990s, and what they changed for walking.
Research history of implanted electrodes in people with paralysis, from the late 1990s to BrainGate, robotic arm studies and speech decoding, and the open questions.
How myoelectric arms, controlled by the electrical signals of muscles, grew from mid-twentieth-century experiments into the powered arms used today.
A history of neuroprosthetics, devices linked to nerves or the brain: early electrical stimulation, cochlear implants, nerve-controlled limbs and what research has shown so far.
How artificial arms developed from medieval iron hands and Renaissance mechanisms to cable-driven, body-powered designs that remain in use today.
From wooden pegs and rubber feet to the cushioned heel and energy-storing carbon-fiber blades, a history of how artificial feet and ankles changed.
How artificial hands evolved: why hooks often beat fingers, how grip mechanisms work, and the arrival of multi-fingered hands with individually moving digits.
A history of powered knees and ankles with motors and sensors, how they differ from passive limbs, and what researchers have and have not shown.
Why no one can name the first prosthetic limb, and how makers such as Ambroise Pare, Pieter Verduyn, James Potts and Civil War craftsmen shaped artificial limb making.
Ancient artificial limbs that survive or are described in texts: the Egyptian toes, the Capua leg, and early iron and wooden hands, with what is known and what is not.
How artificial limbs came to be fitted to the individual: plaster casts and socket making, patellar tendon bearing sockets, scanning, CAD/CAM and 3D printing.
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