THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MUSCULOSKELETAL STRENGTH, PHYSIOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS, AND KNEE KINESTHESIA FOLLOWING FATIGUING EXERCISE

Fatiguing exercise may result in impaired functional joint stability and increased risk of unintentional injury. While there are several musculoskeletal and physiological characteristics related to fatigue onset, their relationship with proprioceptive changes following fatigue has not been examined. The purpose of this study was to establish the relationship between musculoskeletal and physiological characteristics and changes in proprioception, measured by threshold to detect passive motion (TTDPM), following fatiguing exercise. Twenty, physically active females participated (age: 28.65 ± 5.6 years, height: 165.6 ± 4.3 cm, weight: 61.8 ± 8.0 kg, BMI: 22.5± 2.3 kg/m2, BF: 23.3 ± 5.4%). During Visit 1, subjects completed an exercise history and 24-hour dietary questionnaire, and body composition, TTDPM familiarization, isokinetic knee strength, and maximal oxygen uptake/lactate threshold assessments. During Visit 2, subjects completed TTDPM and isometric knee strength testing prior to and following a fatiguing exercise protocol. Wilcoxon signed rank tests determined TTDPM and isometric knee strength changes from pre- to post- fatigue. Spearman’s rho correlation coefficients determined the relationship between strength and physiological variables with pre- to post-fatigue changes in TTDPM and with pre-fatigue and post-fatigue TTDPM in extension and flexion (α=0.05). No significant differences were demonstrated from pre-fatigue to post-fatigue TTDPM despite a significant decrease in isometric knee flexion strength (P<0.01) and flexion/extension ratio (P<0.05) following fatigue. No significant correlations were observed between strength or physiological variables and changes in TTDPM from pre- to post-fatigue in extension or flexion. Flexion/extension ratio was significantly correlated with pre-fatigue TTDPM in extension (r=-0.231, P<0.05). Peak oxygen uptake was significantly correlated with pre-fatigue (r=-0.500, P<0.01) and post-fatigue (r=-0.520, P<0.05) TTDPM in extension. No significant relationships were demonstrated between musculoskeletal and physiological characteristics and changes in TTDPM following fatigue. The results suggest that highly trained individuals may have better proprioception, and that the high fitness level of subjects in this investigation may have contributed to absence of TTDPM deficits following fatigue despite reaching a high level of perceptual and physiological fatigue. Future studies should consider various subject populations, other musculoskeletal strength characteristics, and different modalities of proprioception to determine the most important contributions to proprioceptive changes following fatigue

Experimental analysis of the fatigue life of threaded pipe connections under cyclic bending

When subjected to cyclic loads, fatigue cracks can cause failure of pipe systems joined by threaded pipe connections. In this study, the effect of contact conditions and coupling geometry is investigated experimentally. Fatigue tests under cyclic bending are carried out on three different threaded connection configurations. The resulting fatigue lives are compared and fracture surfaces are investigated. The fatigue cracks are found to initiate at the last engaged thread of the pin and fatigue life can be increased by applying PTFE tape or changing the coupling geometry

High temperature fatigue characteristics of P/M and hot-forged W-Re and TZM for X-ray target of CT scanner

The fatigue strengths at 1000 °C of layered W-Re/TZM, bulk W-Re and bulk TZM for x-ray target materials were successfully evaluated under load-controlled four-point bending by introducing a fatigue failure criterion as twotimes increase of initial compliance. The obtained fatigue strengths at 1000 °C for layered W-Re/TZM and bulk WRe were similar and 280 MPa and 290 MPa at 106 cycles, respectively, while that of bulk TZM was 200 MPa. During fatigue loading at 1000 °C, dominant fatigue damage would be multiple intergranular crack nucleation and propagation, which would induce the increase of compliance. The reasonability of the fatigue failure criterion was confirmed by the fatigue process observations and the results of room temperature fatigue tests of the specimens tested at 1000 °C up to the cycles corresponding to the fatigue failure criterion

Obtaining the fatigue laws of bituminous mixtures from a strain sweep test: effect of temperature and aging

Fatigue is associated with the deterioration caused by applying repeated loads, and is affected by temperature or aging. Generally, time sweep tests are used to simulate fatigue, in order to obtain the fatigue laws. However, this requires too much time, often preventing its use. A method to estimate the fatigue laws from a strain sweep test is presented. The test was performed on a semi-dense mixture with different types of binder (unconditioned or aged) tested at different temperatures. This test is able to estimate fatigue laws more quickly, allowing the effect of different factors on the mixtures' fatigue life to be studied.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Fatigue life prediction of z-fibre pinned composite laminate under mode I loading

A hybrid method is presented combining linear elastic fracture mechanics with nonlinear damage mechanics that can predict the fatigue crack growth rate in z-fibre pinned composites under mode I loading. The strain energy release rate is evaluated using the virtual crack closure technique via finite element analysis. Cohesive elements are used in the pinned region to represent the crack bridging force generated by the pins. The reduction of the pins' bridging force under the fatigue loading is accommodated by applying a degradation law, based on damage mechanics with empirical fitting parameters. A modified degradation law is proposed which is capable of accumulating fatigue damage under varying crack opening displacement ranges experienced by the pins during fatigue loading. Fatigue testing was performed with a z-pinned double cantilever beam at two different values of applied displacement amplitude. The predictions show reasonably good agreement with the test results in terms of the fatigue crack propagation rate and fatigue life

Framework for Dynamic Evaluation of Muscle Fatigue in Manual Handling Work

Muscle fatigue is defined as the point at which the muscle is no longer able to sustain the required force or work output level. The overexertion of muscle force and muscle fatigue can induce acute pain and chronic pain in human body. When muscle fatigue is accumulated, the functional disability can be resulted as musculoskeletal disorders (MSD). There are several posture exposure analysis methods useful for rating the MSD risks, but they are mainly based on static postures. Even in some fatigue evaluation methods, muscle fatigue evaluation is only available for static postures, but not suitable for dynamic working process. Meanwhile, some existing muscle fatigue models based on physiological models cannot be easily used in industrial ergonomic evaluations. The external dynamic load is definitely the most important factor resulting muscle fatigue, thus we propose a new fatigue model under a framework for evaluating fatigue in dynamic working processes. Under this framework, virtual reality system is taken to generate virtual working environment, which can be interacted with the work with haptic interfaces and optical motion capture system. The motion information and load information are collected and further processed to evaluate the overall work load of the worker based on dynamic muscle fatigue models and other work evaluation criterions and to give new information to characterize the penibility of the task in design process.Comment: International Conference On Industrial Technology, Chengdu : Chine (2008

An experimental validation of the fatigue damaging events extracted using the wavelet bump extraction (WBE) algorithm

This paper describes an experimental validation of the fatigue damaging events that were identified and extracted using a wavelet-based fatigue data editing technique. This technique, known as the Wavelet Bump Extraction (WBE) algorithm, is specifically designed to summarise a long record of fatigue variable amplitude (VA) loading whilst preserving the original load cycle sequence. Using WBE the fatigue damaging events were identified and extracted in order to produce a mission signal. In order to validate the effectiveness of WBE in practical applications a VA road load time history that was measured on a road vehicle suspension arm was taken as a case study. Uniaxial fatigue tests were performed using the original signal, the WBE mission signal and the individual WBE extracted segments. A mirror polished specimen of SAE 1042 steel was tested using a servo-hydraulic machine. The fatigue lives measured for these VA loadings were then compared to the fatigue lives calculated from a VA strain loading fatigue damage model. The results show a good fatigue life correlation at the coefficient of 0.98 between the prediction and experiment. For the road load time history considered, the WBE mission signal was found to be only 40% the time duration of the original time history while maintaining 60% of the fatigue damage according to analytical calculation and 87% according to experimental testing

Unipolar and bipolar fatigue in antiferroelectric lead zirconate thin films and evidences for switching-induced charge injection inducing fatigue

For the first time, we show that unipolar fatigue does occur in antiferroelectric capacitors, confirming the predictions of a previous work [Appl. Phys. Lett., 94, 072901 (2009)]. We also show that unipolar fatigue in antiferroelectrics is less severe than bipolar fatigue if the driving field is of the same magnitude. This phenomenon has been attributed to the switching-induced charge injection, the main cause for polarization fatigue in ferroelectric and antiferroelectric materials. Other evidences for polarization fatigue caused by the switching-induced charge injection from the nearby electrode rather than the charge injection during stable/quasi-stable leakage current stage are also discussed.Comment: 10 pages and 2 figure

Muscle fatigue degrades force sense at the ankle joint

To investigate the effects of muscle fatigue on force sense at the ankle joint, 10 young healthy adults were asked to perform an isometric contra-lateral force ankle-matching task in two experimental conditions of: (1) no-fatigue and (2) fatigue of the plantar-flexor muscles. Measures of the overall accuracy and the variability of the force matching performances were determined using the absolute error and the variable error, respectively. Results showed less accurate and less consistent force matching performances in the fatigue than no fatigue condition, as indicated by decreased absolute and variable errors, respectively. The present findings evidence that muscle fatigue degrades force sense at the ankle joint

Automated Pin-Dot Marking Effects on A709-Gr50 Steel Plate Fatigue Capacity

During fabrication of multi-piece steel bridge assemblies, markings are often made on the steel surface to identify/track individual pieces or to provide reference for fabrication layout or later erection. Automated marking methods such as computer numerically controlled (CNC) pin-dot marking offer fabrication efficiencies; however, for marked steel sections subjected to frequent or repeated loading (i.e. bridge girders) many code specifications require experimental testing to verify any marking effects on fatigue capacity. In this study, the effects of automated pin-dot markings on the fatigue capacity of A709-Gr50 bridge steel are experimentally investigated from 13 specimens considering 2 marking frequencies (corresponding to marking speeds of 50in./min and 10in./min), 2 applied stress ranges (35ksi and 45ksi), and 2 material orientations (both longitudinal and transverse plate rolling directions). Results from the 13 high-cycle fatigue tests, along with other fatigue test results from the literature indicate that the surface markings from the automated marking systems have no effect on the fatigue capacity of the A709-Gr50 plate. All marked specimens achieved higher fatigue capacities than would be expected for unmarked specimens meeting the AASHTO fatigue detail category ‘A’ designation