• Korean Journal of Applied Biomechanics
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.87-93
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• 2022

Objective: The purpose of this research was to investigate the age-related changes in whole-body motor variability during sit-to-stand (STS) task. It has been reported that children perform motor tasks less accurately with greater variability as compared to adults. However, it is still unknown how they utilize the abundant degrees of freedom and accomplish voluntary actions. Uncontrolled manifold (UCM) analysis has been used to partition motor variabilities into two independent variability components, task-relevant variability (V_ORT) and task-irrelevant variability (V_UCM). We investigated what differences exist between children and adults with respect to these two motor variability components in relation to motor development stages. Method: Ten 6-year-old children (height: 116.2 ± 4.3 cm, weight: 23.1 ± 3.9 kg, motor development assessment percentile score: 77.5 ± 18.6%), ten 10-year-old children (height: 138.7 ± 7.2 cm, weight: 35.8 ± 10.3 kg, motor development assessment percentile score: 73.9 ± 12.7%), and ten young adults (age: 23 ± 1.6 year-old, height: 164.3 ± 11.4 cm, weight: 60.8 ± 12.0 kg) participated in this study. Each participant performed STS ten times, and a motion capture system was used to capture the whole-body kinematics. Each segment centers of mass and the whole-body center of mass were calculated, and UCM analysis was used to quantify motor variabilities, V_ORT and V_UCM. One-way ANOVA was used for statistical analysis. Results: We found that children produced more motor variabilities in V_ORT and V_UCM in all three dimensions, anterior-posterior, medial-lateral, and vertical. As age increased, both, V_ORT and V_UCM significantly decreased (p<.05). Conclusion: The greater V_ORT found in children compared to adults indicates that the repeatability over repetitions improves through development, while the greater V_UCM found in children suggests that children better utilize the abundant degrees of freedom during STS compared to adults.

• The Journal of Korean Physical Therapy
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.38-42
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• 2015

Purpose: Accuracy and variability of movement in daily life require synchronization of muscular activities through a specific chronological order of motor performance, which is controlled by higher neural substrates and/or lower motor centers. We attempted to investigate whether transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over primary sensorimotor areas (SM1) could influence movement variability in healthy subjects, using a tapping task. Methods: Twenty six right-handed healthy subjects with no neurological or psychiatric disorders participated in this study. They were randomly and equally assigned to the real tDCS group or sham control group. Direct current with intensity of 1 mA was delivered over their right SM1 for 15 minutes. For estimation of movement variability before and after tDCS, tapping task was measured, and variability was calculated as standard deviation of the inter-tap interval (SD-ITI). Results: At the baseline test, there was no significant difference in SD-ITI between the two groups. In two-way ANOVA with repeated measurement no significant differences were found in a large main effect of group and interaction effect between two main factors (i.e., group factor and time factor (pre-post test)). However, significant findings were observed in a large main effect of the pre-post test. Conclusion: Our findings showed that the anodal tDCS over SM1 for 15 minutes with intensity of 1 mA could enhance consistency of motor execution in a repetitive-simple tapping task. We suggest that tDCS has potential as an adjuvant brain facilitator for improving rhythm and consistency of movement in healthy individuals.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.7-11
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• 2005

The purposes of this study were to investigate the effects of variability of training on the acquisition of motor skill of closed loop type tracking task using Rotary Pursuit, and to determine if there was a bilateral transfer effect to the non-dominant hand following practice with the dominant hand. Twelve healthy volunteer students (5 males and 7 females, aged 25 to 37) were randomly divided into a constant practice group and a variable practice group. A photoelectric rotary pursuit apparatus with stop clock and repeat cycle timer by Lafayette Instrumentation Co. was used for this study. Rotary pursuit is a closed loop task in which a subject attempts to keep a photoelectric stylus on a lighted target in motion. Subjects performed the clockwise circular pursuit task while standing. Experimental procedure was divided into three sessions, namely, pre-test, training, and post-test. The constant group practiced all 60 trials at 30 rpm. Variable practice group did a varied practice session with 15 trials at speeds of 20 rpm, 26 rpm, 34 rpm, and 46 rpm. No one in either group practiced with their non-dominant arm. A Mann-Whitney test and a Wilcoxon Signed Ranks test were used for statistical analyses. The results of this study showed no different training effect between groups on the post-test with the dominant hand. However, bilateral transfer effect of rotary pursuit task between hands was demonstrated. Possible mechanisms are discussed.

• The Journal of Korean Physical Therapy
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.67-87
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• 2005

Impaired sensorimotor function of the hand ipsilateral to a unilateral brain damage has been reported in a variety of motor task. however, it is still the controversial issue because of the difficulty of detection in clinical situation, patients' variability(time after onset, contralateral upper extremity severity, other cognitive functions including apraxia), and the performed various motor task. The purpose of this study is to determine the presence of ipsilateral motor deficit following unilateral brain damage in three different specific tasks(hand tapping, visual tracking and coin rotation) compared with healthy age-sex matched control group using the same hand and to investigate the lateralized motor control in each hemispheric function. Findings revealed that stroke patients with unilateral brain damage experienced difficulties with rapid-simple repetitive movement, visuomotor coordination, complex sequencing movement on ipsilateral side. Also, Comparison of the left-hemispheric stroke groups and the right-hemispheric stroke groups revealed that patients with a left-hemisphere damage tended to be more variable in performing all of the three tasks. These results show that stroke patient with left hemisphere damage has more ipsilateral motor deficit, and the left hemisphere contributes to the processing of motor control that necessary for the executing actions with ipsilateral hand.

• Proceedings of the KSPS conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.59-62
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• 2006

Young children's speech is compared to adult-to-adult speech and adult-to-child speech by measuring durations and variability of each segment in CVC words. The results demonstrate that child speech exhibits an inconsistent timing relationship between consonants and vowels within a word. In contrast, consonant and vowel durations in adult-to-adult speech and adult-to-child speech exhibit significant relationships across segments, despite variability of segments when speaking rate is decreased. The results suggest that temporal patterns of young children are quite different from those of adults, and provide some evidence for lack of motor control capability and great variance in articulatory coordination.

• Journal of Power Electronics
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.957-966
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• 2014

Some of DC actuators used in home automation, office automation, medical equipment and automotive systems require a position sensor. In low power applications, the introduction of such a transducer remarkably increases the whole system cost, which justifies the development of sensorless position estimation techniques. The well-known AC motor drive sensorless techniques exploiting the fundamental component of the back electromotive force cannot be used on DC motor drives. In addition, the sophisticated approaches based on current or voltage signal injection cannot be used. Therefore, an effective and inexpensive sensorless position estimation technique suitable for DC motors is presented in this paper. This technique exploits the periodic pulses of the armature current caused by commutation. It is based on a simple pulse counting algorithm, suitable for coping with the rather large variability of the pulse frequency and it leads to the realization of a sensorless position control system for low cost, medium performance systems, like those in the field of automotive applications.

• Journal of Korean Physical Therapy Science
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.43-53
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• 2022

Background: It is suggested that the decline in functional level due to aging influences the increase in traffic accidents among elderly drivers. Among the functions related to the driving behavior of older drivers, physical function is related to muscle strength and motor control, and aging causes deterioration of motor control and a defect in motor output variability. Method: Data Search The online databases used for literature search are PubMed, ProQuest(PML), NDSL, and literature searches were conducted from April 19 to April 26, 2022. For the search, 'aging', 'driving', and 'braking' were used in the investigation. Results: The physical functions related to the braking ability of elderly drivers were analyzed in muscle strength, reaction ability, motor control, and other related factors. In terms of muscle strength, 3 studies analyzed the above factors. 8 studies analyzed the above factors for response ability. For motor control, two studies analyzed the above factors. In addition, related factors were analyzed in one piece. Conclusion: As a result of the analysis, physical function for reaction ability showed the highest frequency, followed by the strength item with the highest frequency. This study suggests that factors that can increase physical function must be included in the development of a rehabilitation program for the driving ability of the elderly.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.30 no.2 s.245
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• pp.194-201
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• 2006

Gait analysis is essential to identify accurate cause and knee condition from patients who display abnormal walking. Traditional linear tools can, however, mask the true structure of motor variability, since biomechanical data from a few strides during the gait have limitation to understanding the system. Therefore, it is necessary to propose a more precise dynamic method. The chaos analysis, a nonlinear technique, focuses on understand how variations in the gait pattern change over time. Eight healthy eight subjects walked on a treadmill for 100 seconds at 60 Hz. Three dimensional walking kinematic data were obtained using two cameras and KWON3D motion analyzer. The largest Lyapunov exponent from the measured knee angular displacement time series was calculated to quantify local stability. This study quantified the variability present in time series generated from gait parameter via chaos analysis. Knee flexion-extension patterns were found to be chaotic. The proposed Lyapunov exponent can be used in rehabilitation and diagnosis of recoverable patients.

• Korean Journal of Applied Biomechanics
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.121-127
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• 2022

Objective: The purpose of this study was to investigate potential effects of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) on bimanual force control capabilities in healthy young adults. Method: Eighteen right-handed healthy young adults (10 females and 8 males; age: 23.55 ± 3.56 yrs) participated in this crossover design study. All participants were randomly allocated to both active-tDCS and sham-tDCS conditions, respectively. While receiving 20 min of active- or sham-tDCS interventions, all participants performed bimanual isometric force control tasks at four submaximal targeted force levels (i.e., 5%, 10%, 15, and 20% of maximal voluntary contraction: MVC). To compare bimanual force control capabilities including force accuracy, variability, and regularity between active-tDCS and sham-tDCS conditions, we conducted two-way repeated measures ANOVAs (2 × 4; tDCS condition × Force levels). Results: We found no significant difference in baseline MVC between active-tDCS and sham-tDCS conditions. Moreover, our findings revealed that providing bilateral tDCS including anodal tDCS on left primary motor cortex (M1) and cathodal on right M1 while conducting bimanual force control trials significantly decreased force variability and regularity at 5%MVC. Conclusion: These findings suggest that providing bilateral tDCS on M1 areas may improve bimanual force control capabilities at a relatively low targeted force level.

• Journal of Physiology & Pathology in Korean Medicine
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.71-80
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• 2021

Parkinson's disease is one of the typical neurodegenerative disease and it is caused by the destruction of substantia nigra in brain leading to lack of dopamine secretion, and it presents 4 major motor symptoms such as tremor, bradykinesia, stiffness, postural instability. Furthermore, it causes many non-motor symptoms such as anosmia, REM sleep conduct disorder, orthostatic hypotension, dementia and autonomic ataxia such as lack of adjusting blood pressure, hyperhydrosis, constipation. Dopaminergic therapy is the most commonly used strategy, but long term treatment of levodopa induce various adverse effects. Thus, many people are focusing on new therapies other than established therapies, and there are many tries and approaches with paradigm shift. Our medical team was able to get 4 cases of PD patients who are hospitalized in our hospital, treated by Whole Body Gi-Hyeol Therapy consisting of acupuncture therapy, herbal therapy, and mental therapy, and their conditions improved in perspective of Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale(UPDRS), Heart Rate Variability(HRV), and Quality of life. Among all 4 cases, UPDRS score and quality of life score is gotton better, and among 2 cases SDNN, RMS-SD, TP, LF, HF scores are finely increased. And PDQ-39 score which shows quality of life is also improved. However, in spite of these improvements and positive results, there were no meaningful improvement in a hurt from a fall which is important to the aged, muscular atrophy which causes bone fracture and SMI(Skeletal Muscle Mass Index) which is indicator of osteoporosis. Thus, supplementary treatment about Whole Body Gi-Hyeol Therapy such as more active nutrition intervention, safe and effective kinesitherapy is needed, and from now on continuous case reports and systematic clinical research which has control group must be carried out.