Making an Exoskeleton | Breakthrough

It all went down at a place called The Guardian Center, a huge installation where they trained First Responders for earthquakes, terrorist situations. They even have their own subway tunnel with an exploded train. It's the perfect place to see the Foris exoskeleton, designed by a team of engineers at Lockheed Martin.

Foris is an aluminum and carbon fiber frame exoskeleton with two mechanical arms designed to give tools a zero-gravity weightless feel. It lets workers in a variety of industries wield heavy tools for hours on end. The lady wielding this tool is Trish Elker; she's the head of the Foris design team.

"It's very lightweight; it's very easy to put on; it's very adjustable to adjust from Keith's body type to my body size, right? So it's one size will generally fit all."

After the Guardian guys get our test vehicle positioned, they'll deliver a tailor-made emergency situation. "Very exciting! Have we taken bets on what's going to get destroyed besides the car? Here we go!"

Oh, this will be the first time the Foris is being used in a first responder situation. It's also the first time it's being used with the Jaws of Life, a 35 lb tool used to pry open the doors of crashed cars. "Awesome! Holy cow! Awesome! Nicely done!"

That's how they work. It may look simple, but making an exoskeleton that's a help and not a hindrance is a deceptively difficult engineering task. The fact that it's designed to adjust and fit any sized person only makes it more challenging.

Anthropometry is the measurements of the human body. Everybody's anthropometry is different. Your knee may be higher or shorter than mine; you know, your thigh is longer or shorter. Everything's going to be unique; no two people are the same.

And so, that's why the system has to be so adjustable. It has to be able to accommodate all those different anthropometries. Guess creating an interface between man and machine is what cyborgs are all about, and I'm beginning to understand that it may be the hardest problem in turning us into next generation humans.