Muscle recruitment and coordination with an ankle exoskeleton |
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| Institution: | 1. Mechanical Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States;2. WRF Institute of Neuroengineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States;3. Mechanical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, United States;1. Department of Mechanical & Materials Engineering, Faculty of Engineering & Built Environment, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia 43600 UKM Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia;2. Mechanical Engineering Department, Politeknik Sultan Azlan Shah, Behrang, 35950, Perak, Malaysia;1. Department of Neurorehabilitation Engineering, University Medical Center Goettingen, Georg-August University, Goettingen, Germany;2. Centre for Musculoskeletal Research, Griffith Health Institute, Griffith University, Southport, QLD, Australia;3. Faculty of Science and Faculty of Engineering, University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA, Australia;1. Department of Human Movement Sciences, Faculty of Behavioural and Movement Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam Movement Sciences, Netherlands;2. TNO, Leiden, Netherlands;3. Department of Advanced Robotics, Instituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Genoa, Italy;4. School of Design/Health Research Institute, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland;1. School of Rehabilitation, Université de Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada;2. Pathokinesiology Laboratory, Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Rehabilitation of Greater Montreal, Institut universitaire sur la réadaptation en déficience physique de Montréal, CIUSSS Centre-Sud-de-l’Île-de-Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada |
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| Abstract: | Exoskeletons have the potential to assist and augment human performance. Understanding how users adapt their movement and neuromuscular control in response to external assistance is important to inform the design of these devices. The aim of this research was to evaluate changes in muscle recruitment and coordination for ten unimpaired individuals walking with an ankle exoskeleton. We evaluated changes in the activity of individual muscles, cocontraction levels, and synergistic patterns of muscle coordination with increasing exoskeleton work and torque. Participants were able to selectively reduce activity of the ankle plantarflexors with increasing exoskeleton assistance. Increasing exoskeleton net work resulted in greater reductions in muscle activity than increasing exoskeleton torque. Patterns of muscle coordination were not restricted or constrained to synergistic patterns observed during unassisted walking. While three synergies could describe nearly 95% of the variance in electromyography data during unassisted walking, these same synergies could describe only 85–90% of the variance in muscle activity while walking with the exoskeleton. Synergies calculated with the exoskeleton demonstrated greater changes in synergy weights with increasing exoskeleton work versus greater changes in synergy activations with increasing exoskeleton torque. These results support the theory that unimpaired individuals do not exclusively use central pattern generators or other low-level building blocks to coordinate muscle activity, especially when learning a new task or adapting to external assistance, and demonstrate the potential for using exoskeletons to modulate muscle recruitment and coordination patterns for rehabilitation or performance. |
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| Keywords: | Orthosis Muscle synergy Cocontraction Metabolics Electromyography |
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