Kinematics of human arm reconstructed from spatial tracking system recordings

• Published in: Journal of biomechanics 2000-08, Vol.33 (8), p.985-995
• Main Authors: Biryukova, E.V., Roby-Brami, A., Frolov, A.A., Mokhtari, M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Arm - anatomy & histology; Arm - physiology; Biomechanical Phenomena; Computational methods; Degrees of freedom (mechanics); Diagnostic Imaging - methods; Diagnostic Imaging - standards; Elbow - physiology; Electromagnetic Phenomena - instrumentation; Electromagnetic Phenomena - standards; Error analysis; Female; Humans; Joint angles; Joints (anatomy); Joints - physiology; Kinematics; Male; Middle Aged; Models, Biological; Movement - physiology; Rigid body assumption; Rotation; Shoulder - physiology; Space life sciences; Upper limb model; Wrist - physiology
• ISSN: 0021-9290; 1873-2380
• DOI: 10.1016/S0021-9290(00)00040-3

The kinematics of the human arm in terms of angles of rotations in the joints is reconstructed from the spatial tracking system (Fastrack ™ Polhemus) recordings. The human arm is modeled by three rigid bodies (the upper arm, the forearm and the hand) with seven degrees of freedom (three in the shoulder, two in the elbow and two in the wrist). Joint geometry parameters (orientations of the axes relative to the arm segments, the angles and the distances between the axes) have been calculated on the basis of passive rotations in the joints. The calculated parameters have been used to solve the direct kinematics problem for the reaching movements in different directions. The difference between calculated and recorded positions and accelerations of the hand has been used to assess the accuracy of the proposed method of kinematics reconstruction. The error analysis showed that spatial tracking system recordings and human arm kinematics reconstruction could reliably be used to accurately analyze multijoint movement in humans.