Despite advances in total knee arthroplasty (TKA), approximately 20% of patients have historically reported dissatisfaction with their knee replacement. Kinematic alignment (KA) has emerged as an alternative to conventional mechanical alignment (MA), aiming to restore the patient's individual knee anatomy rather than aligning the prosthesis with the mechanical axis of the lower limb.

This research project compares the functional outcomes of both surgical approaches. Patients undergoing TKA with either mechanical or kinematic alignment are assessed using gait analysis before surgery and at one and five years postoperatively.

Advanced robotic prosthetic hands remain expensive, mechanically complex and difficult to control intuitively. As a result, their widespread adoption in upper-limb prosthetics has been limited. Many commercially available prosthetic hands therefore still offer either primarily cosmetic restoration or only a limited range of functions compared with the human hand.

The European SoftPro project aimed to address these challenges by bringing together expertise in robotics, neuroscience and prosthetics to develop more effective and intuitive solutions for upper-limb prosthesis users. The project received €7.4 million in funding through the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme.

The research focused on six key areas: sensorimotor synergies, human–robot interaction, simplified functional representations of everyday hand movements, improved methods for assessing rehabilitation outcomes, open-source tools for sharing knowledge and technology, and closer collaboration between research institutions, clinical partners and industry.

Further information is available on the SoftPro project website.

Malalignment of the lower limb can lead to uneven loading of the knee joint and may contribute to degenerative changes. In skeletally immature patients, guided growth is an effective treatment for correcting angular deformities. However, recurrence of the deformity, known as the rebound phenomenon, may occur after treatment.

This research project investigates the relationship between dynamic knee loading during walking and the risk of rebound following surgical guided growth. Motion analysis is performed before treatment and during follow-up for up to 12 months after treatment completion.

The aim is to identify factors contributing to the rebound phenomenon and to improve clinical decision-making regarding the timing of implantation and implant removal.