Human Leg Model Predicts Muscle Forces, States, and Energetics during Walking.

ABSTRACT: Humans employ a high degree of redundancy in joint actuation, with different combinations of muscle and tendon action providing the same net joint torque. Both the resolution of these redundancies and the energetics of such systems depend on the dynamic properties of muscles and tendons, particularly their force-length relations. Current walking models that use stock parameters when simulating muscle-tendon dynamics tend to significantly overestimate metabolic consumption, perhaps because they do not adequately consider the role of elasticity. As an alternative, we posit that the muscle-tendon morphology of the human leg has evolved to maximize the metabolic efficiency of walking at self-selected speed. We use a data-driven approach to evaluate this hypothesis, utilizing kinematic, kinetic

SUBMITTER: Markowitz J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4866735 | biostudies-literature | 2016 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature