as technology advances prosthetic limbs
are getting more sophisticated and more
lifelike bionic hands are advancing to
the point that they can do many of the
same tasks as a human
hand but how do today's state of the art
Prosthetics change the relationship
between humans and
Technology are they just a useful tool
or could they be considered a human
enhancement motor technology is getting
better and better all the time the big
step forward is going to be improving
that link with the body and also have
feedback someone's got to pick it up and
not have the cognitive load of thinking
it's just got to become second
nature I just consider myself a normal
person that's lucky enough to have a
bionic
hand
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Nikki Ashwell was born without her right
hand and became the first woman in
Britain to use an advanced prosthetic
that's designed to be as lifelike as
possible the hand is myoelectric which
means it's controlled by Contracting
muscles in the arm to move the bionic
fingers into different grips Nikki's
always viewed herself as a one-handed
person so I'm interested to find out if
this new prosthetic has changed the way
she sees herself or her relationship
with
technology so you were born without a
hand is that right mm yeah I was born
without my right hand and we don't
really know why it's just the way I came
out and I've I've found ways in life to
adapt so that I I feel like although I
don't do everything in a way that other
people would expect me to I find my own
way and you've had a few different
Prosthetics before what was your first
reaction when you heard about this new
bionic hand um I was a bit skeptical to
be honest I'm very well adapted to doing
everything in my life with just one hand
so the idea that I that there could be a
technology out there that was good
enough to make me change my ways and
actually do things with two hands was
not that convincing since I've got it
though I have been one over it's got
these different grip patterns that mean
I can do things that I couldn't actually
do before how long did it take to get
used to it it took a while um not
because of the operating action that was
really easy but what took a while was
overcoming that hurdle of relearning
everything because I've spent so much of
my life doing things with one hand or
having my little adapted ways of doing
things I had to make sure I had the
patience to do things
differently how does this bionic hand
compare to some of your previous
Prosthetics these are ones I had as a
child how old were you with that one
that is Tiny I think I had that at 6
months old but the idea was that I tried
having two hands so that I could the
doctors could see whether I would take
to it or not and compared to these more
kind of lifelike skin texture arms it
does look very robotic I didn't choose
how it looks but I'm actually far
happier for it to look like this than to
for it to try and imitate a real hand in
its appearance cuz I'm not trying to
fool anyone I'm not trying to say
actually I have two hands it's more up
front there's no
hiding the hand Nikki uses is called the
B bionic small it's made by a company
called steeper in leads which claims it
uses technology from Formula 1 and swiss
watchmaking to make the hand as
functional as possible I wanted to find
out how the mechanics inside Nikki's
hand worked and and what predictions the
engineers at steeper had for the future
of
Prosthetics so tell us about the bionic
how does this differ from other
Prosthetics well traditionally if you
get a myio electric hand it's just
generally an open and close whereas you
get incredibly High grip force in a
small area so things like a wine glass
or a piece of fruit is quite difficult
to control whereas this has got five
digits that all Drive in independently
so it can wrap around and give a really
compliant
grip the other thing that the hands are
doing that makes it look very natural is
each of the fingers are tracking the
other so if one's going too slow every
50 milliseconds they check where each
are and adjust to get a perfect grip the
tripod grip which is the thumb and the
two fingers coming together that's quite
difficult to do and it's taken a few
generations of hands to get it
absolutely
perfect what do you imagine the
prosthetic hand in 5 years time or 10
years time would look like so I think 10
to 15 may be growing them back you know
I think there's going to be you can see
real advances in that those sort of
building organic systems over printed
structures so there's like ear
structures and things already been made
uh hand is very very complex but you
know in that time frame I imagine we
might be more biologically integrated
than we are
now I wanted to try one of the
myoelectric hands for myself
by strapping a couple of electrodes to
my arm I could control it by flexing and
relaxing my
muscles these are just electrodes just
electrodes and what they do is pick up
the electrical impulses from the surface
of your skin when you move your muscles
and I'm going to plug you in to the hand
so if you just move your hand forward
for
me wow there we go and move your hand
backwards
again so that's uh one grip you've got
there which is uh what we call key grip
for holding a a key card or something so
if you close the hand again you could
see you could hold a uh a key or a
credit card or something in in that grip
there I thought it would take a while to
get used to but I seem to be able to do
it straight away can you imagine this
ever being better than a human hand or
having different functions well it could
do we could have lots of different
functions make like a Swiss army knife
and have um all sorts of tools and
gadgets and giz BOS and stuff hidden
hidden in the fingers but the question
is should we do that uh should we make
something that is that is better than a
human
hand while the hand's very Advanced it's
clear we still have a way to go until
technology catches up with
Evolution but it's not hard to imagine
the Prosthetics of the future offering
functionality beyond the human
body at an event in London Nikki joined
a panel to discuss the future of
Prosthetics and whether a hand like hers
could be cons considered a human
enhancement do you feel
enhanced no I feel different this is me
with my robot hand on and then sometimes
I'm me without it on I mean compared to
the guy I was when I lost my arm I'm not
enhanced I'm not a cyborg if you say are
you disabled and I I would say no I'm
differently abled and you know I am I'm
different
[Applause]
Nigel uses an older version of the B
bionic hand unlike Nikki he was born
with two hands but lost one in an
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accident overall what has it meant to
you having this hand the void started to
be
filled a psychiatrist said to me one
time just before I got
this where do you see yourself in a year
or so
sitting in a field somewhere out in my
car with a hose pipe attached to the
exhaust that's all I could
see so it is for you it's it's making up
for something you thought you lost it's
given me a life when I didn't think I'd
have
one for Nigel the hand has dramatically
changed his life but Nikki is Keen not
to become too dependent on the
technology do you still consider
yourself a one-handed person or is this
like your own hand now I do still
consider myself a one-handed person cuz
that's what I was for nearly 30 years um
however I appreciate that I now also
consider this as part of me somebody
that I kind of just met started touching
the hand touching the fingers and I got
that reaction of what are you doing why
are you touching me um and I think that
says to me that I've accepted it as part
of my body have you seen the arms that
are kind of brain controlled and that
kind of thing has that ever appealed to
you um I've yeah I've seen them heard
about
them I think anything that's got some
sort of permanent wiring doesn't really
appeal to me I find this one easy enough
to control as it is I don't really need
to control it with my mind I'm already
going you know what open hand easy I I
don't need any more integration into my
body than that
having a bionic hand has changed how
Nikki does things but what's most
interesting is how it's changed her
sense of self to her the hand is more
than a gadget but it's not part of her
body as possibilities for human
enhancement Advance the main challenge
may not be the technology but how we
relate to it and how it changes our
perspective on what it is to be
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human