Muscle Activation Training Device with Force Direction Feedback
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional exercise equipment for rehabilitation after strokes fails to provide accurate feedback on muscle activation patterns, often promoting compensating behaviors by masking direction errors with increased force magnitude, leading to ineffective training.
Innovation Solution
A training device equipped with a multi-axis force sensor and controller that provides immediate and distinct feedback on the direction of applied force, using visual, audio, or kinematic means to separate force direction from magnitude, allowing users to correct their muscle activation patterns effectively.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If conventional exercise equipment provides resistance along a constrained path, then movement along the desired path is facilitated, but direction errors in muscle activation are masked and compensating behaviors are promoted
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements immediate feedback mechanisms that display the actual direction of force applied by the user in real-time during exercise. This feedback allows users to see the deviation between their intended force direction and actual force direction, enabling them to correct muscle activation patterns without the masking effect of constrained paths.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces the traditional mechanical constraint system with an electronic sensing and display system. Instead of using physical guides to constrain movement, the system uses force sensors to detect actual force direction and electronic displays to show deviations, allowing users to self-correct without mechanical interference.
2Productivity
If force magnitude is increased to compensate for direction errors, then movement of the exercise device is maintained, but the root muscle activation errors are not addressed
Solution Approach 1:
The system separately displays force direction and force magnitude to the user, allowing them to distinguish between directional errors and magnitude issues. This separate feedback prevents users from compensating for direction errors by simply pushing harder, as they can see the directional deviation independently from the force magnitude.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the feedback into distinct components: force direction feedback and force magnitude feedback. This segmentation allows users to independently address directional accuracy and force production, preventing the conflation of these two separate muscle activation tasks.
3Ease of operation
If the direction of applied force is not perpendicular to the constrained movement, then movement may still occur, but the feedback on muscle activation pattern is ambiguous and ineffective
Solution Approach 1:
The system provides clear visual feedback that directly indicates the actual direction of applied force relative to the target direction. This feedback eliminates ambiguity by showing users exactly how their force direction deviates from the desired perpendicular direction, enabling precise correction of muscle activation patterns.
Data Source
AI summary
A training device isolates muscular force direction from force magnitude to provide improved feedback to a user over conventional exercise equipment which implicitly conflates magnitude and force direction in producing purely kinematic feedback.