Zak Vawter, is a determined 31-year-old man from Yelm, Washington who lost his right leg in a motorcycle accident. Recently he reached the top of one of the world’s tallest skyscrapers with help from a mind-controlled prosthetic limb. He became the first person to ever climb the 103-storey Willis Tower using a prosthetic limb.
Mr. Vawter showed off his smart limb for the first time during an annual stair climbing charity event organized by the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, where he has been receiving treatment for his injury. This event raises money for the institute’s rehabilitation care and research, where nearly 3,000 climbers climbed about 2,100 steps to the Willis Tower’s SkyDeck level. The research done at the Rehabilitation Institute has produced bionic, or thought controlled prosthetic arms, for some time now. Only recently have the developed bionic legs, which weigh approximately 10 lbs and has two motors, which respond to electrical impulses from muscles in the hamstring. Before climbing 103 story’s Vawter trained with this new technology on a small escalator at a gym, while researchers spent months making the proper adjustments to the technical aspects to ensure that the leg would respond correctly to his thoughts.
Although the experiment was a great success, the bionic leg will stay in Chicago when Vawter returns home. It is still years away from being marketed and researchers will continue to refine its technology until it is perfected.
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