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Computed myography: three-dimensional reconstruction of motor functions from surface EMG data. (English) Zbl 1157.35124

Summary: We describe a methodology called computed myography to qualitatively and quantitatively determine the activation level of individual muscles by voltage measurements from an array of voltage sensors on the skin surface. A finite element model for electrostatics simulation is constructed from morphometric data. For the inverse problem, we utilize a generalized Tikhonov regularization. This imposes smoothness on the reconstructed sources inside the muscles and suppresses sources outside the muscles using a penalty term. Results from experiments with simulated and human data are presented for activation reconstructions of three muscles in the upper arm (biceps brachii, bracialis and triceps). This approach potentially offers a new clinical tool to sensitively assess muscle function in patients suffering from neurological disorders (e.g., spinal cord injury), and could more accurately guide advances in the evaluation of specific rehabilitation training regimens.

MSC:

35R30 Inverse problems for PDEs
35Q80 Applications of PDE in areas other than physics (MSC2000)
65N30 Finite element, Rayleigh-Ritz and Galerkin methods for boundary value problems involving PDEs
65N21 Numerical methods for inverse problems for boundary value problems involving PDEs
92C30 Physiology (general)
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