Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

Medical technology

Balancing the unbalanced

Elderly but healthy people are often seriously injured in falls. Exploiting the phenomenon of stochastic resonance, biological physicists have designed a shoe with a vibrating insole that helps maintain balance.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Buy this article

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

References

  1. Eurich, C. W. & Milton, J. G. Phys. Rev. E 54, 6681–6684 (1996).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Cabrera, J. L. & Milton, J. G. Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 158702 (2002).

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  3. Priplata, A. A., Niemi, J. B., Harry, J. D., Lipsitz, L. A. & Collins, J. J. Lancet 362, 1123–1124 (2003).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Priplata, A. A. et al. Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 238101 (2002).

  5. Liu, W. et al. Arch. Phys. Med. Rehabil. 83, 171–176 (2002).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Maddox, J. Nature 352, 469 (1991).

  7. Wiesenfeld, K. & Moss, F. Nature 373, 33–36 (1995).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Moss, F., Ward, L. M. & Sannita, W. G. Clin. Neurophysiol. (in the press).

  9. Collins, J. J., Imhoff, T. T. & Grigg, P. Nature 383, 770 (1996).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Manjarrez, E., Rojas-Piloni, G., Méndez, I. & Flores, A. J. Neurosci. 23, 1997–2001 (2003).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Russell, D., Wilkens, L. & Moss, F. Nature 402, 291–293 (1999).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  12. Kitajo, K. Nozaki, D., Ward, L. M. & Yamamoto, Y. Phys. Rev. Lett. 90, 218103 (2003).

  13. Stépán, G. & Kollár, L. Math. Comput. Modelling 31, 199–205 (2000).

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Moss, F., Milton, J. Balancing the unbalanced. Nature 425, 911–912 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/425911a

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/425911a

This article is cited by

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing