Abstract
Muscular moment arm length as a dynamic muscular parameter is the foundation of biomechanical analysis of human musculoskeletal system. The purpose of this study is to estimate individual dynamic muscular moment arm length of lower limb in the sagittal plane during gait. In the paper, a series of regression equations obtained by inputting skeletal morphological parameters of lower limb was structured to calculate muscular origin-insertion coordinates in musculoskeletal coordinates system. The anthropometric method of measuring skeletal morphological parameters of lower limb was designed to represent individual skeletal features, which method can be conveniently operated on subject body in vivo. By integrating the kinematical data and the origin-insertion coordinates, an algorithm was developed to calculate dynamic muscular moment arm length. This algorithm can be applied on estimation of the dynamic parameters of single articular muscles and biarticular muscles. By our experimental studies of 10 subjects, data of the dynamic muscular parameters were collected in the sagittal plane during normal walking. Data collected were typical dynamic muscular moment arm lengths of lower limb, including muscles of Soleus (SO), Tibilis Anterior (TA), Biceps Femoris Caput Breve (BS), Glusteus (GU), Vastus (VS), Iliopsoas (IL), Gastrocnemius (GA), Rectus Femoris (RF) and Hamstring (HA). The results suggest that the method is feasible for estimating personalized dynamic muscular moment arm length to build biomechanical model.
