People who wear soft exosuits use 23% less energy when walking while also reducing stress on their ankle joints, according to a recently published study out of Harvard.

The researchers previously showed that a soft robotic exosuit could lower energy expenditures in healthy people who need to carry things on their backs, but the new research shows that it can also decrease metabolic rates through exosuit assistance.

The research team offboarded the actuation, electronics and battery units from the exosuit in order to specifically calculate how the exosuit impacted a user’s joints. All that was left was the light wearable textiles and pulling cables of the exosuit.

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