THE world looked on as 22-year-old Nan Davis took her first tremulous steps
after four years confined to a wheelchair. She had been paralysed from the waist
down after a car crash on the day of her high school graduation. But electrodes
attached to the outside of her legs were stimulating her muscles and enabling
her to “walk” once again.
A harness supported most of her weight and her legs moved unsteadily. But the
technology gave new hope to many disabled people with spinal injuries. The aim
was simple, said Jerrold Petrofsky, the scientist who led the work at Wright…
