Assistive Technology Lab., Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Federal University of Uberlandia, Uberlandia 38408-100, Brazil.
Faculty of Computer Science, Federal University of Uberlandia, Uberlandia 38408-100, Brazil.
Sensors (Basel). 2018 Dec 6;18(12):4293. doi: 10.3390/s18124293.
The quantitative measurement of an articular motion is an important indicator of its functional state and for clinical and pathology diagnoses. Joint angle evaluation techniques can be applied to improve sports performance and provide feedback information for prostheses control. Polymer optical fiber (POF) sensors are presented as a novel method to evaluate joint angles, because they are compact, lightweight, flexible and immune to electromagnetic interference. This study aimed to characterize and implement a new portable and wearable system to measure angles based on a POF curvature sensor. This study also aimed to present the system performance in bench tests and in the measurement of the elbow joint in ten participants, comparing the results with a consolidated resistive goniometer. Results showed high repeatability of sensors between cycles and high similarity of behavior with the potentiometer, with the advantage of being more ergonomic. The proposed sensor presented errors comparable to the literature and showed some advantages over other goniometers, such as the inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensor and over other types of POF sensors. This demonstrates its applicability for joint angle evaluation.
关节运动的定量测量是其功能状态的一个重要指标，也是临床和病理诊断的重要指标。关节角度评估技术可用于提高运动表现，并为假肢控制提供反馈信息。聚合物光纤（POF）传感器作为一种评估关节角度的新方法被提出，因为它具有结构紧凑、重量轻、灵活和抗电磁干扰等优点。本研究旨在描述和实现一种新的基于 POF 曲率传感器的便携式和可穿戴角度测量系统。本研究还旨在介绍该系统在台架测试和十名参与者的肘关节测量中的性能，并将结果与传统的电阻式测角计进行比较。结果表明，传感器在循环之间具有很高的重复性，并且与电位计的行为高度相似，具有更符合人体工程学的优点。所提出的传感器的误差与文献中的值相当，并显示出相对于其他测角计（如惯性测量单元（IMU）传感器和其他类型的 POF 传感器）的一些优势。这证明了它在关节角度评估中的适用性。
