Development and validation of realistic neuromuscular controllers to simulate full body movements in daily life activities.
The aim of this project is to develop and validate neuromuscular controllers based on realistic neural pathways. The simulations are developed to simulate full body daily life activities, like sit-to-walk. The framework is developed to study how changes in the physical capacity (muscles, nerves), altered movement objectives or disturbed sensory inputs affect movement strategies in various conditions. The controllers use delayed proprioceptive feedback from muscle length, force, velocity, and upper-body orientation (vestibular feedback). The pathways include monosynaptic an antagonistic feedback.
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A planar neuromuscular controller to simulate age-related adaptation strategies in the sit-to-walk movement.
van der Kruk, E., & Geijtenbeek, T. (2023). bioRxiv, 2023-11.
We developed a planar sit-to-walk musculoskeletal model (11 degrees-of-freedom, 20 muscles) and neuromuscular controller, consisting of a two-phase stand-up controller and a reflex-based gait controller. The stand-up controller contains generic neural pathways of delayed proprioceptive feedback from muscle length, force, velocity, and upper-body orientation (vestibular feedback) and includes both monosynaptic an antagonistic feedback pathways. The control parameters where optimized using a shooting-based optimization method. Simulations were compared to recorded kinematics, ground reaction forces, and muscle activation from young and older adults.
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Increased trunk flexion in standing up is related to muscle weakness rather than pain avoidance in individuals with unilateral knee pain; a simulation study.
van der Kruk, E., & Geijtenbeek, T. (2023). medRxiv, 2023-12.
The simulations demonstrate that a decrease in muscular capacity led to greater trunk flexion. Pain avoidance led to slower movement speeds and altered muscle recruitments, but not to greater trunk flexion. The predictive simulations thus indicate that increased trunk flexion is more likely the result of lack of muscular reserve rather than pain avoidance.
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Predictive Neuromuscular Simulation of the Sit-to-Walk movement.
van der Kruk, E., & Geijtenbeek, T. (2021). Dynamic Walking Conference.
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IDENTIFYING SENSORIMOTOR CONTROL PHASES FOR PREDICTIVE SIMULATIONS USING VESTIBULAR CONTRIBUTIONS TO BALANCE
Katla Kristín Guðmundsdóttir, Patrick A. Forbes, Eline van der Kruk, ESB Conference 2024.
Predictive neuromuscular simulation is a powerful tool that can be used to examine how age-related decline in the neuromuscular system affects complex movement behaviours. These models rely on neuromuscular controllers that modulate sensory feedback – including vestibular information – to transition between different motor control phases. These phase transitions are commonly defined in gait simulations based on thresholds on the kinetics and kinematics of movement. The transitions between control phases in more complex movement, like rising from a chair, however, are not yet clear. Therefore, control phases of recently published predictive simulations on sit-to-walk (STW) have not yet been verified [1]. The aim of this study was to experimentally determine the contribution of vestibular feedback during a sit-to-walk task using electric vestibular stimulation (EVS) [2].
Finished Graduation projects
Her work provides a great first framework to help us understand how amputees compensate during this critical daily activity, investigating the risk of injury and long-term degeneration of the intact limb. With her findings we want to find key compensation strategies and optimized stiffness and damping values for prosthetic knees and ankles, to test in future experimental testing.
MSc students working on this project
Yuxi Zheng
MSc student – TU Delft
Ties Schukking
MSc student – TU Delft
Graduated MSc students
Lianne Botman (2024) – VU Amsterdam
thesis: How decline in neuromusculoskeletal capacity affects fall risk after tripping: A predictive simulation study
BODIES 