SALT LAKE CITY — If you watched the Super Bowl last week, you may have seen shots of a bionic arm in a piece narrated by Brad Pitt titled "What It Means to Be American on Super Bowl Sunday.”
This technology is being developed at the University of Utah. FOX13 News stopped by to interview the developers of the device and its recipients.
Like many Americans, Perry Mason Pezzarossi, from Mississippi, valiantly served his country. Unfortunately, however, he suffered an injury.
"I had a service-connected injury, which eventually led to my amputation," Pezzarossi explained.
Pezzarossi had to have his arm amputated.
"Everyone told me, once you have the amputation, it's going to hurt you, it's going to bother you enough. It's fine, it's fine, until the day they unwrapped it and I saw it for the first time, and that was in August of 2017.”
The big question was in the lead-up to the surgery: What was the best option for a prosthetic so Pezzarossi could live as normal a life as possible?
From Mississippi, he found the University of Utah and a program called the LUKE Arm, (Named for Luke Skywalker who had his hand chopped off in the Empire Strikes Back).
"I never dreamed that there would be a day when I would have a prosthetic hand where the fingers articulated, the wrist pronated, supinated, flexed, and extended. I never thought that was possible," he shared.
After a lot of testing and work, Pezzarossi is now the proud recipient of one of the University's arms which he showed off to FOX 13 News.
The first time he was able to use it was emotional for him.
"Oh, I cried like a baby, for real, because, I mean, I had never seen anything like this," Pezzarossi said. "I didn’t know it was real because, at the time, it really wasn’t real, except in a lab setting.”
Since then, he has moved from learning basic skills like opening doors and putting on shoes, to feeling like his new arm is a true part of him.
"So this is my arm," Pezzarossi shared. "That’s crazy. It just looks different than yours"
I responded by adding, “But it looks cooler,” Perry laughed saying “Maybe!“
It does, however, come with questions Perry said
"What is it? Where did you get it? Is it real?" he listed. "That's a lot of the biggest questions: how does it work? And that's when I need Jake on my side to explain it because I’m not smart enough.”
He pointed to Jacob George, the director of the Utah Neurorobotics Lab who has been working on the technology for a long time at the University.
"It predates me and even those who predated me," George said. "I’ve been developing and building this technology in one way or another since about 2015, so almost a decade now.”
Together with his team, they made this technology a reality from just Science fiction.
"We’re at the point where individuals can really take the system home and use it in a completely unsupervised manner," George explained.
So, with how cool it looked I had to try it. Using a motion scanner, similar to an Xbox Kinect camera, I was able to control the hand, and it followed my every move which in itself was fascinating. But what is even more incredible that the University of Utah has done, is blend existing technologies, like the hand itself and the implants used, to create something extraordinary."With our system, we have an implanted device that allows the person to simply think about moving their hand, and it moves with their thoughts. And what’s better than a bionic arm controlled by thoughts? Well, that same arm can actually give a person a sense of touch," Jacob explained.
So Perry’s arm not only is controlled by just his thoughts, but the robotic arm can give him feelings back. If that isn’t amazing, I don’t know what is. "When they make contact with an object, the forces on that hand get translated into stimulation of their nerve, which then causes them to feel a sensation as if it were coming from their missing limb," Jacob added.
Other applications are just on the horizon as well, like creating exoskeletons for stroke patients and shrinking this same technology down to the size of a smartwatch with students and faculty are all working toward helping people."In the first reactions that we've seen from patients, the responses are always the most inspiring for our work," Jacob said. Other students chimed in saying "To use that to help people regain their independence and improve their quality of life is just really satisfying.” With another adding “We've had a lot of people wanting to come back and try the device over and over again.”
So, what’s next? Well, this technology is just a few steps away from being available to the world."The device recently got a breakthrough device designation, which is basically a fast track to bring this to market," Jacob explained.
Some of the hurdles now involve making sure that insurance companies will look at the device as something they will pay for. That's where patients like Perry become essential again, helping to show how much this amazing device can transform lives. He is even using his journey as inspiration to start a foundation of his own called the First Responder Family Fund."I mean, I've always wanted to help people. Obviously, I let them chop off my arm and put in 330-something implants.” He continued by saying “So if there's someone, an advocate who can talk to you, educate you, teach you, and just keep you in the right mental state, as long as you don't give up, there’s always hope.”
You can find out more about the impressive work being done at the University of Utah right here.
