A customized model for 3D human segmental kinematic coupling analysis by optoelectronic stereophotogrammetry

The study of three-dimensional human kinematics has significant impacts on medical and healthcare technology innovations. As a non-invasive technology, optoelectronic stereophotogrammetry is widely used for in-vivo locomotor evaluations. However, relatively high testing difficulties, poor testing accuracies, and high analysis complexities prohibit its further employment. The objective of this study is to explore an improved modeling technique for quantitative measurement and analysis of human locomotion. Firstly, a 3D whole body model of 17 rigid segments was developed to describe human locomotion. Subsequently, a novel infrared reflective marker cluster for 17 body segments was constructed to calibrate and record the 3D segmental position and orientation of each functional body region simultaneously with high spatial accuracy. In addition, the novel calibration procedure and the conception of kinematic coupling of human locomotion were proposed to investigate the segmental functional characteristics of human motion. Eight healthy male subjects were evaluated with walking and running experiments using the Qualisys motion capture system. The experimental results demonstrated the followings: (i) The kinematic coupling of the upper limbs and the lower limbs both showed the significant characteristics of joint motion, while the torso motion of human possessed remarkable features of segmental motion; (ii) flexion/extension was the main motion feature in sagittal plane, while the lateral bending in coronal plane and the axial rotation in transverse plane were subsidiary motions during an entire walking cycle regarding to all the segments of the human body; (iii) compared with conventional methods, the improved techniques have a competitive advantage in the convenient measurement and accurate analysis of the segmental dynamic functional characteristics during human locomotion. The modeling technique proposed in this paper has great potentials in rehabilitation engineering as well as ergonomics and biomimetic engineering. © 2010 Science China Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.