Recovery of lower limb function following 6 weeks of non-weight bearing

Skeletal muscle weakness and atrophy occur following an extended period of decreased use, including space flight and limb unloading. It is also likely that affected muscles will be susceptible to a re-loading injury when they begin return to earth or weight bearing. However, there is a paucity of literature evaluating the response of human unloaded muscle to exercise and return to activity.

The purpose of this pilot study was to evaluate the soreness, function and strength response of muscle to re-loading in seven patients who were non-weight bearing for 6 weeks, compared to five healthy subjects.

Function improved significantly over time for the patients but was still less than the healthy subjects over 12 weeks of physiotherapy. Concentric quadriceps muscle strength increased significantly over time for the patients. There was considerable variability in the patients’ reports of muscle soreness but there were no significant changes over time or between groups.     

航天员虚拟训练中的一维直线运动速度规划算法

研究了身穿航天服的航天员在搬运物体时的运动规律，将搬运物体的过程进行了分类。结合传统的六段加减速算法，对每种情况下的肌肉激活度进行了规划,并采用粒子群算法进行求解。利用Matlab/Simulink搭建了上肢骨骼肌模型，实现了目标物体的速度规划。将动态加速度约束转变为静态肌肉激活度约束，提出了一种在动态加速度约束下基于肌肉激活度规划的速度规划算法。用Matlab对提出的算法进行了验证，证明了算法的可行性。与其他的速度规划算法相比，提出的算法所规划的肌肉激活度更符合人体生物力学，提高了航天员的训练效率。