Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

ICA-based muscle–tendon units localization and activation analysis during dynamic motion tasks

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Medical & Biological Engineering & Computing Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This study proposed an independent component analysis (ICA)-based framework for localization and activation level analysis of muscle–tendon units (MTUs) within skeletal muscles during dynamic motion. The gastrocnemius muscle and extensor digitorum communis were selected as target muscles. High-density electrode arrays were used to record surface electromyographic (sEMG) data of the targeted muscles during dynamic motion tasks. First, the ICA algorithm was used to decompose multi-channel sEMG data into a weight coefficient matrix and a source matrix. Then, the source signal matrix was analyzed to determine EMG sources and noise sources. The weight coefficient vectors corresponding to the EMG sources were mapped to target muscles to find the location of the MTUs. Meanwhile, the activation level changes in MTUs during dynamic motion tasks were analyzed based on the corresponding EMG source signals. Eight subjects were recruited for this study, and the experimental results verified the feasibility and practicality of the proposed ICA-based method for the MTUs’ localization and activation level analysis during dynamic motion. This study provided a new, in-depth way to analyze the functional state of MTUs during dynamic tasks and laid a solid foundation for MTU-based accurate muscle force estimation, muscle fatigue prediction, neuromuscular control characteristic analysis, etc.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Ackland DC, Pak P, Richardson M, Pandy MG (2008) Moment arms of the muscles crossing the anatomical shoulder. J Anat 213:383–390

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  2. Angel RW (1981) Electromyographic patterns during ballistic movements in normals and hemiplegic patients. Prog Clin Neurophysiol 347:357

    Google Scholar 

  3. Bergin MG, Vicenzino B, Hodges PW (2013) Functional differences between anatomical regions of the anconeus muscle in humans. J Electromyogr Kinesiol 23:1391–1397

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Besier TF, Lloyd DG, Ackland TR (2003) Muscle activation strategies at the knee during running and cutting maneuvers. Med Sci Sports Exerc 35:119–127

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Bordalo-Rodrigues M, Rosenberg ZS (2005) MR imaging of the proximal rectus femoris musculotendinous unit. Magn Reson Imaging Clin N Am 13:717–725

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  6. Buchanan TS, Lloyd DG, Manal K, Besier TF (2004) Neuromusculoskeletal modeling: estimation of muscle forces and joint moments and movements from measurements of neural command. J Appl Biomech 20:367–395

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  7. Chen MQ, Zhou P (2015) A novel framework based on FastICA for high density surface EMG decomposition. IEEE Trans Neural Syst Rehabil Eng 24:117–127

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  8. Evans N (2015) Bodybuilding anatomy, 2E. Human Kinetics, Champaign

    Google Scholar 

  9. Farina D, Leclerc F, Arendit-Nielsen L, Buttelli O, Madeleine P (2008) The change in spatial distribution of upper trapezius muscle activity is correlated to contraction duration. J Electromyogr Kinesiol 18:16–25

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  10. Gyftopoulos S, Rosenberg ZS, Schweitzer ME, Bordalo-Rodrigues M (2008) Normal anatomy and strains of the deep musculotendinous junction of the proximal rectus femoris: MRI features. Am J Roentgenol 190:W182–W186

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Hasselman CT, Best TM, Hughes C, Martinez S, Garrett WE (1995) An explanation for various rectus femoris strain injuries using previously undescribed muscle architecture. Am J Sports Med 23:493–499

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  12. He J, Zhang D, Sheng X, Meng J, Zhu X (2013) Improved discrete fourier transform based on spectral feature for surface electromyogram signal classification. In: ieee international conference on engineering in medicine and biology society, pp 6897–6900

  13. Hu X, Suresh NL, Xue C, Rymer WZ (2015) Extracting extensor digitorum communis activation patterns using high-density surface electromyography. Front Physiol 6:279

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  14. Huang CJ, Chen X, Cao S, Zhang X (2016) Muscle-tendon units localization and activation level analysis based on high-density surface EMG array and NMF algorithm. J Neurnal Eng 13:066001

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Hyvärinen A (1999) Fast and robust fixed-point algorithms for independent component analysis. IEEE Trans Neural Netw 10:626–634

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  16. Hyvärinen A, Oja E (2000) Independent component analysis: algorithms and applications. Neural Netw 13:411–430

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  17. Leijnse JN, Carter S, Gupta A, McCabe S (2008) Anatomic basis for individuated surface EMG and homogeneous electrostimulation with neuroprostheses of the extensor digitorum communis. J Neurophysiol 100:64–75

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  18. Naik GR, Kumar DK, Weghorn H (2007) ICA based identification of sources in sEMG. In: International conference on intelligent sensors, pp 619–624

  19. Nakamura H, Yoshida M, Kotani M, Akazawa K, Moritani T (2004) The application of independent component analysis to the multi-channel surface electromyographic signals for separation of motor unit action potential trains: part I-measuring techniques. J Electromyogr Kinesiol 14:423–432

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Nejat N, Mathieu PA, Bertrand M (2012) Investigation on Muscle Compartments in the biceps brachii. J Med Biol Eng 32:251–258

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Renström PA (1992) Tendon and muscle injuries in the groin area. Clin Sports Med 11:815–831

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  22. Richardson M (2011) Muscle atlas of the extremities. Bare Bones Books, Seattle

    Google Scholar 

  23. Riemann BL, Limbaugh GK, Eitner JD, LeFavi RG (2011) Medial and lateral gastrocnemius activation differences during heel-raise exercise with three different foot positions. J Strength Cond Res 25:634–639

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  24. Rojas-Martínez M, Mañanas MA, Alonso JF (2012) High-density surface EMG maps from upper-arm and forearm muscles. J Neuroeng Rehabil 9:85

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  25. Rojas-Martínez M, Mañanas MA, Alonso JF, Merletti R (2013) Identification of isometric contractions based on high density EMG maps. J Electromyogr Kinesiol 23:33–42

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  26. Sartori M, Reggiani M, Farina D, Lloyd DG (2012) EMG-driven forward-dynamic estimation of muscle force and joint moment about multiple degrees of freedom in the human lower extremity. PLoS ONE 7:e52618

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  27. Schumann NP, Biedermann FHW, Kleine BU, Stegeman DF, Roeleveld K, Hackert R, Scholle HC (2002) Multi-channel EMG of the M. triceps brachii in rats during treadmill locomotion. Clin Neurophysiol 113:1142–1151

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  28. Segal RL, Wolf SL, Chopp MT, English AW (1991) Anatomical partitioning of 3 multiarticular human muscles. Cells Tissues Organs 142:261–266

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  29. Song T, Meng B, Chen B, Zhao D, Cao Z, Ye J, Yu M (2015) Detection of genioglossus myelectric activity using ICA of multi-channel mandible sEMG. Technol Health Care 23:529

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  30. Thelen DG, Anderson FC, Delp SL (2003) Generating dynamic simulations of movement using computed muscle control. J Biomech 36:321–328

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  31. Watanabe K, Kouzaki M, Moritani T (2012) Task-dependent spatial distribution of neural activation pattern in human rectus femoris muscle. J Electromyogr Kinesiol 22:251–258

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  32. Wickham JB, Brown JMM (1998) Muscles within muscles: the neuromotor control of intra-muscular segments. Eur J Appl Physiol 78:219–225

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  33. Wickham JB, Brown JM (2012) The function of neuromuscular compartments in human shoulder muscles. J Neurophysiol 107:336–345

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  34. Wickham JB, Brown JMM, McAndrew DJ (2004) Muscles within muscles: anatomical and functional segmentation of selected shoulder joint musculature. J Musculoskelet Res 8:57–73

    Article  Google Scholar 

  35. Wolf SL, Kim JH (1997) Morphological analysis of the human tibialis anterior and medial gastrocnemius muscles. Cells Tissues Organs 158:287–295

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  36. Zwarts MJ, Stegeman DF (2003) Multichannel surface EMG: basic aspects and clinical utility. Muscle Nerve 28:1–17

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to all the subjects for their participation in this study. This work was supported by the National Nature Science Foundation of China under Grants 61431017 and 61671417.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electronic Science and Technology, University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), Hefei, China

    Xiang Chen, Shaoping Wang, Chengjun Huang, Shuai Cao & Xu Zhang

Authors
  1. Xiang Chen
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Shaoping Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Chengjun Huang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Shuai Cao
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Xu Zhang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Xiang Chen.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

No competing interests.

Ethical approval

Each subject signed an informed consent form before commencing the experiment, which was approved by the ethical committee of the university.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Chen, X., Wang, S., Huang, C. et al. ICA-based muscle–tendon units localization and activation analysis during dynamic motion tasks. Med Biol Eng Comput 56, 341–353 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11517-017-1677-z

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11517-017-1677-z

Keywords

Search

Navigation