A method for computing the three-dimensional angular velocity and acceleration of a body segment from three-dimensional position data

A theoretical technique, based on the Method of Least Squares, was employed to solve for the three-dimensional components of the angular velocity and acceleration of a limb segment directly from experimentally recorded three-dimensional position data. Results showed that a minimum of four targets placed on the body segment, forming six relative position vector equations, were required to produce the most accurate results. It was also found that this method eliminates the errors due to soft tissue motion and system noise.