Trunk Inclination Estimate During the Sprint Start Using an Inertial Measurement Unit: A Validation Study

The proper execution of the sprint start is crucial in determining the performance during a sprint race. In this respect, when moving from the crouch to the upright position, trunk kinematics is a key element. The purpose of this study was to validate the use of a trunk-mounted inertial measurement unit (IMU) in estimating the trunk inclination and angular velocity in the sagittal plane during the sprint start. In-laboratory sprint starts were performed by five sprinters. The local acceleration and angular velocity components provided by the IMU were processed using an adaptive Kalman filter. The accuracy of the IMU inclination estimate and its consistency with trunk inclination were assessed using reference stereophotogrammetric measurements. A Bland-Altman analysis, carried out using parameters (minimum, maximum, and mean values) extracted from the time histories of the estimated variables, and curve similarity analysis (correlation coefficient > 0.99, root mean square difference < 7 deg) indicated the agreement between reference and IMU estimates, opening a promising scenario for an accurate in-field use of IMUs for sprint start performance assessment

Reconstruction of skeletal movement using skin markers: comparative assessment of bone pose estimators

BACKGROUND: The assessment of the accuracy of the pose estimation of human bones and consequent joint kinematics is of primary relevance in human movement analysis. This study evaluated the performance of selected pose estimators in reducing the effects of instrumental errors, soft tissue artifacts and anatomical landmark mislocations occurring at the thigh on the determination of the knee kinematics. METHODS: The pattern of a typical knee flexion-extension during a gait cycle was fed into a knee model which generated a six-components knee kinematics and relevant marker trajectories. The marker trajectories were corrupted with both instrumental noise and soft tissue artifacts. Two different cluster configurations (4 and 12-marker cluster) were investigated. Four selected pose estimators, a Geometrical method, a SVD-based method, and the Pointer Cluster Technique in the optimized and non optimized version, were analyzed. The estimated knee kinematics were compared to the nominal kinematics in order to evaluate the accuracy of the selected pose estimators. RESULTS: Results have shown that optimal pose estimators perform better than traditional geometric pose estimators when soft tissue artifacts are present. The use of redundant markers improved in some cases the estimation of the dynamics of the kinematics patterns, while it does not reduce the offsets from the nominal kinematics curves. Overall, the best performance was obtained by the SVD-based pose estimator, while the performance of the PCT pose estimator in its optimal version was not satisfactory. However, the knee kinematics errors reached 5 deg for rotations and 10 mm for translations). CONCLUSION: Given the favorable experimental conditions of this study (soft tissue artifacts determined from a young, healthy and non overweight subject), the errors found in estimating the knee kinematics have to be considered unsatisfactory even if the best performing pose estimator is used. Therefore, it is the authors' opinion that the movement analysis research community should make additional efforts in the search of more subject specific error models to increase the accuracy of joint kinematics estimations

Control of the upper body accelerations in young and elderly women during level walking

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The control of the head movements during walking allows for the stabilisation of the optic flow, for a more effective processing of the vestibular system signals, and for the consequent control of equilibrium.</p> <p>In young individuals, the oscillations of the upper body during level walking are characterised by an attenuation of the linear acceleration going from pelvis to head level. In elderly subjects the ability to implement this motor strategy is reduced. The aim of this paper is to go deeper into the mechanisms through which the head accelerations are controlled during level walking, in both young and elderly women specifically.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>A stereophotogrammetric system was used to reconstruct the displacement of markers located at head, shoulder, and pelvis level while 16 young (age: 24 ± 4 years) and 20 older (age: 72 ± 4 years) female volunteers walked at comfortable and fast speed along a linear pathway. The harmonic coefficients of the displacements in the medio-lateral (ML), antero-posterior (AP), and vertical (V) directions were calculated via discrete Fourier transform, and relevant accelerations were computed by analytical double differentiation. The root mean square of the accelerations were used to define three coefficients for quantifying the attenuations of the accelerations from pelvis to head, from pelvis to shoulder, and from shoulder to head.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The coefficients of attenuation were shown to be independent from the walking speed, and hence suitable for group and subject comparison.</p> <p>The acceleration in the AP direction was attenuated by the two groups both from pelvis to shoulder and from shoulder to head. The reduction of the shoulder to head acceleration, however, was less effective in older women, suggesting that the ability to exploit the cervical hinge to attenuate the AP acceleration is challenged in this population. Young women managed to exploit a pelvis to shoulder attenuation strategy also in the ML direction, whereas in the elderly group the head acceleration was even larger than the pelvis acceleration.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The control of the head acceleration is fundamental when implementing a locomotor strategy and its loss could be one of the causes for walking instability in elderly women.</p

Assessment of level-walking aperiodicity

BACKGROUND: In gait analysis, walking is assumed to be periodic for the sake of simplicity, despite the fact that, strictly speaking, it can only approximate periodicity and, as such, may be referred to as pseudo-periodic. This study aims at: 1) quantifying gait pseudo-periodicity using information concerning a single stride; 2) investigating the effects of walking pathway length on gait periodicity; 3) investigating separately the periodicity of the upper and lower body parts movement; 4) verifying the validity of foot-floor contact events as markers of the gait cycle period. METHODS: Ten young healthy subjects (6 males, 23 ± 5 years) were asked to perform various gait trials, first along a 20-m pathway that allowed reaching a steady-state condition, and then along an 8-m pathway. A stereophotogrammetric system was used to reconstruct the 3D position of reflective markers distributed over the subjects' body. Foot contact was detected using an instrumented mat. Three marker clusters were used to represent the movement of the whole body, the upper body (without upper limbs), and the lower body, respectively. Linear and rotational kinetic, and gravitational and elastic potential "energy-like" quantities were used to calculate an index J(t) that described the instantaneous "mechanical state" of the analysed body portion. The variations of J(t) in time allowed for the determination of the walking pseudo-period and for the assessment of gait aperiodicity. RESULTS: The suitability of the proposed approach was demonstrated, and it was shown that, for young, healthy adults, a threshold of physiological pseudo-periodicity of walking at natural speed could be set. Higher pseudo-periodicity values were found for the shorter pathway only for the upper body. Irrespective of pathway length, the upper body had a larger divergency from periodicity than the lower body. The error that can be made in estimating the gait cycle duration for the upper body from the heel contacts was shown to be significant. CONCLUSION: The proposed method can be easily implemented in gait laboratories to verify the consistency of a recorded stride with the hypothesis of periodicity

Knowledge discovery in databases of biomechanical variables: application to the sit to stand motor task

BACKGROUND: The interpretation of data obtained in a movement analysis laboratory is a crucial issue in clinical contexts. Collection of such data in large databases might encourage the use of modern techniques of data mining to discover additional knowledge with automated methods. In order to maximise the size of the database, simple and low-cost experimental set-ups are preferable. The aim of this study was to extract knowledge inherent in the sit-to-stand task as performed by healthy adults, by searching relationships among measured and estimated biomechanical quantities. An automated method was applied to a large amount of data stored in a database. The sit-to-stand motor task was already shown to be adequate for determining the level of individual motor ability. METHODS: The technique of search for association rules was chosen to discover patterns as part of a Knowledge Discovery in Databases (KDD) process applied to a sit-to-stand motor task observed with a simple experimental set-up and analysed by means of a minimum measured input model. Selected parameters and variables of a database containing data from 110 healthy adults, of both genders and of a large range of age, performing the task were considered in the analysis. RESULTS: A set of rules and definitions were found characterising the patterns shared by the investigated subjects. Time events of the task turned out to be highly interdependent at least in their average values, showing a high level of repeatability of the timing of the performance of the task. CONCLUSIONS: The distinctive patterns of the sit-to-stand task found in this study, associated to those that could be found in similar studies focusing on subjects with pathologies, could be used as a reference for the functional evaluation of specific subjects performing the sit-to-stand motor task

Hip joint centre position estimation using a dual unscented Kalman filter for computer-assisted orthopaedic surgery

In computer-assisted knee surgery, the accuracy of the localization of the femur centre of rotation relative to the hip-bone (hip joint centre) is affected by the unavoidable and untracked pelvic movements because only the femoral pose is acquired during passive pivoting manoeuvres. We present a dual unscented Kalman filter algorithm that allows the estimation of the hip joint centre also using as input the position of a pelvic reference point that can be acquired with a skin marker placed on the hip, without increasing the invasiveness of the surgical procedure. A comparative assessment of the algorithm was carried out using data provided by in vitro experiments mimicking in vivo surgical conditions. Soft tissue artefacts were simulated and superimposed onto the position of a pelvic landmark. Femoral pivoting made of a sequence of star-like quasi-planar movements followed by a circumduction was performed. The dual unscented Kalman filter method proved to be less sensitive to pelvic displacements, which were shown to be larger during the manoeuvres in which the femur was more adducted. Comparable accuracy between all the analysed methods resulted for hip joint centre displacements smaller than 1 mm (error: 2.2 ± [0.2; 0.3] mm, median ± [inter-quartile range 25%; inter-quartile range 75%]) and between 1 and 6 mm (error: 4.8 ± [0.5; 0.8] mm) during planar movements. When the hip joint centre displacement exceeded 6 mm, the dual unscented Kalman filter proved to be more accurate than the other methods by 30% during multi-planar movements (error: 5.2 ± [1.2; 1] mm)

Estimation of subject-specific ligament length variation during knee flexion

Detailed knowledge about subject-specific knee ligament length variation during knee flexion is crucial for musculoskel- etal modeling in human movement analysis and in clinical con- texts (Ascani et al. 2014). In this respect, accurate estimation of ligament origin and insertion locations is needed. Although extensive literature exists describing the ligament attachment site position ex vivo (Kopf et al. 2009), this information is hardly obtainable in vivo unless using medical imaging tech- niques (magnetic resonance, MRI, or computed tomography, CT) that are time- onsuming, expensive and, when radiation is involved, risky for the subjects. Furthermore, the identifica- tion of the ligament attachment site location using MRI may be characterized by significant inter- and intra-observer variabil- ity thus leading to errors that are too large to generate reliable subject-specific knee models (Rachmat et al. 2014). Therefore, the aim of the present study is to propose and validate a method for the accurate in vivo estimation of the subject-specific length of the major knee ligaments (anterior and posterior cruciate, ACL and PCL, medial and collateral ligaments, MCL and LCL) which does not necessarily require the use of medical imaging techniques to identify the ligament attachment sites

Femur, tibia and fibula bone templates to estimate subject-specific knee ligament attachment site locations

In-vivo estimates of the positions of knee ligament attachment sites are crucial for subject-specific knee modelling. The present study provides template digital models of femur, tibia and fibula that embed the positions of centroids of the origins and insertions of cruciate and collateral ligaments, along with information on their dispersion related to inter-individual variability. By using a shape transformation procedure of choice, these templates can be made to match anatomical information measured on a subject under analysis. Generic bone digital models of the femur, tibia and fibula were first chosen as bone templates. Ligament attachment areas were accurately identified through dissection on the bones of 11 knee specimens, and marked using radio opaque paint. Digital models of these bones embedding the positions of the centroids of the identified ligament attachment areas were thereafter obtained using medical imaging techniques. These centroids were mapped onto the relevant bone template, thus obtaining a cloud of 11 points for each attachment site, and descriptive statistics of the position of these points were thereafter determined. Dispersion of these positions, essentially due to inter-individual variability, was below 6 mm for all attachment areas. The accuracy with which subject-specific ligament attachment site positions may be estimated using the bone template models provided in this paper was also assessed using the above-mentioned 11 specimens data set, and a leave-one-out cross validation approach. Average accuracy was found to be 3.3±1.5 mm and 5.8±2.9 mm for femoral and tibial/fibular attachment sites, respectively.The contribution of Ann-Laure Pollastri and of LouisDagneaux is gratefully acknowledged.The authors also thank theParisTech BiomecAM chair program on subject-specific musculoskeletal modelling, with the support of COVEA and Société Général

SIAMOC position paper on gait analysis in clinical practice: General requirements, methods and appropriateness. Results of an Italian consensus conference

Gait analysis is recognized as a useful assessment tool in the field of human movement research. However, doubts remain on its real effectiveness as a clinical tool, i.e. on its capability to change the diagnostic-therapeutic practice. In particular, the conditions in which evidence of a favorable cost-benefit ratio is found and the methodology for properly conducting and interpreting the exam are not identified clearly. To provide guidelines for the use of Gait Analysis in the context of rehabilitation medicine, SIAMOC (the Italian Society of Clinical Movement Analysis) promoted a National Consensus Conference which was held in Bologna on September 14th, 2013. The resulting recommendations were the result of a three-stage process entailing i) the preparation of working documents on specific open issues, ii) the holding of the consensus meeting, and iii) the drafting of consensus statements by an external Jury. The statements were formulated based on scientific evidence or experts' opinion, when the quality/quantity of the relevant literature was deemed insufficient. The aim of this work is to disseminate the consensus statements. These are divided into 13 questions grouped in three areas of interest: 1) General requirements and management, 2) Methodological and instrumental issues, and 3) Scientific evidence and clinical appropriateness. SIAMOC hopes that this document will contribute to improve clinical practice and help promoting further research in the field

A Spot check for estimating stereophotogrammetric errors

Good practice rules in the management of a movement analysis laboratory recommend that photogrammetric measurement errors are assessed, prior to every experimental session, using an ad hoc experiment referred to as a spot check. The paper proposes an inexpensive and easy to make spot check. The test uses a rigid rod carrying two markers and a target point taken on the line joining them and coinciding with the rod tip. The latter point is placed in a fixed and measuredposition in the laboratory frame and the markers are tracked while the rod is kept stationary and while it is manually made to rotate about the target point. Several target points are used within the measurement volume. The instantaneous errors with which the laboratory co-ordinates of the latter points are reconstructed are determined and submitted to statistical analysis. A normalisation procedure is illustrated that aims at making the test results independent from the geometry of the test object. The experimental and analytical methods underlying the proposed spot check were validated experimentally in two movement analysis laboratories using repeated tests. A rod, 1.5m long, carrying four markers was used. In this way, several test-object geometries were tested. Results confirmed that the photogrammetric error could be divided into a zero-mean random and a systematic component. It was shown that the normalisation procedure was effective for the standard deviation of both error components when the two markers were located at a distance between them 1.5 times larger than the distance of their centroid from the tip of the rod. The systematic component bias could not be normalised, however a conservative value of it could be estimated. The two above-mentioned normalised standard deviations and the bias value can be taken as descriptors of the photogrammetric error of the specific measuring system tested. These parameters may also be used to assess the precision and the accuracy with which the laboratory position of a target point, defined relative to any specified marker cluster, may be reconstructed during movement analysis