• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.17 no.8
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• pp.814-823
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• 2011

Nowadays many neurological diseases such as stroke and Parkinson diseases are continually increasing. Orthotic devices as well as exoskeletons have been widely developed for supporting movement assistance and therapy of patients. Robotic knee orthosis can compensate stiff-knee gait of the paralyzed limb and can provide patients consistent assistance at wearable environments. With keeping a robotic orthosis wearable, however, it is not easy to develop a compact and safe actuator with fast rotation and high torque for consistent supports of patients during walking. In this paper, we propose a novel kinematic model for a robotic knee orthosis to drive a knee joint with independent actuation during swing and stance phases, which can allow an actuator with fast rotation to control swing motions and an actuator with high torque to control stance motions, respectively. The suggested kinematic model is composed of a hamstring device with a slide-crank mechanism, a quadriceps device with five-bar/six-bar links, and a patella device for knee covering. The quadriceps device operates in five-bar links with 2-dof motions during swing phase and is changed to six-bar links during stance phase by the contact motion to the patella device. The hamstring device operates in a slider-crank mechanism for entire gait cycle. The kinematics and velocity/force relations are analyzed for the quadriceps and hamstring devices. Finally, the adequate actuators for the suggested kinematic model are designed based on normal gait requirements. The suggested kinematic model will allow a robotic knee orthosis to use compact and light actuators with full support during walking.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.38-45
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• 2017

Background: To improve muscle flexibility, static stretch is the most common type and is considered safe and effective for improving overall flexibility of muscles. During the stretch, the intensity is more likely to be determined by the degree of an athlete's pain and practitioner's skills rather than quantitative measures of stretch. It is necessary to determine the optimal intensity for the stretch. Objects: The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between hand held dynamometer (HHD) and verbal rating scale (VRS) in comparison of the effects of continuance time on active (walking) and inactive (sitting) movement after static stretch. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted with a sample (n=62) recruited from a university. Participants were randomly assigned to 2 different groups (n=31 for each group) based on participants' positions either remaining in sitting or freely walking around for a series of re-assessments. Data was collected at pre-warm up, pre-stretch, post-stretch, and additional assessments at the time of 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 20 and 30 minutes after the stretch. Results: Relationship between VRS and HHD scores represents very weak correlation (Spearman's p=-.16, p>.05). Pearson's correlation analysis was conducted following the logarithmic transformation of the two scores. Pearson's correlation after the transformation still showed a very low relationship and a poor linear relationship between the two scores (Pearson's r=-.18, p>.05). Conclusion: The optimal intensity for stretch cannot be solely determined by the subjective pain perception. The objective measurement such as HHD could be used in conjunction with the pain perception.

• Korean Journal of Applied Biomechanics
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.267-275
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• 2010

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of balance ability improvement exercise program which applied to the elderly people for increasing balance, stability and range of motion. Ten elderly people and ten university students were recruited as the subjects. Kinematic data were collected by seven real-time infrared cameras while subjects walk stair descent as a pre-test. Korean folk dance exercise program was applied to the elderly for 12 weeks. Same experiment on stair descent walk was performed as post-test. Results indicated that CM movement and selected joint angle patterns of elderly group after treatment changed to the similar patterns of young group. However, ankle joint angle and vertical GRF of elderly group after treatment also increased compared to those of the elderly group before treatment. This might be explained by the fact that elderly used a different walking strategy which maximize support base for increasing stability. Overall, these results indicated that the exercise treatment may affect to adapt and improve the gait pattern of stair descent of elderly people.

• Journal of rehabilitation welfare engineering & assistive technology
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.315-321
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• 2017

This paper is a study on the design and realization of Pedestrian navigation service system for the visually impaired. As it is an user interface considering visually impaired, voice recognition functioned smartphone was used as the input tool and the Osteoacusis headset, which can vocally guide directions while recognizing the surrounding environment sound, was used as the output tool. Unlike the pre-existing pedestrian navigation smartphone apps, the developed system guides walking direction by the scale of the left and right stereo sound of the headset wearing, and the voice guidance about the forked or curved path is given several meters before according to the speed of the user, and the user is immediately warned of walking opposite direction or proceeding off the path. The system can acquire stable and reliable directional information using the motion tracker with the dynamic heading accuracy of 1.5 degrees. In order to overcome GPS position error, we proposed a robust trajectory planning algorithm for position error. Experimental results for the developed system show that the average directional angle error is 6.82 degrees (standard deviation: 5.98) in the experimental path, which can be stated that it stably navigated the user relatively.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.12 no.11
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• pp.451-459
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• 2014

This study was to performed to get the reference data of the kinetic parameters for normal subjects according to the arm swing type. Forty-five normal subjects($22.62{\pm}2.69years$) pariticpated in this study and preformed 4 sequence according to the arm swing type as follows; first procedure-normal arm swing, second procedure-one arm swing, thrid procedure-no arm swing, fourth procedure-fitness arm swing. There were significant differences according to the arm swing type in the kinetic parameters such as walking speed, hip power, ground reaction force of vertical in terminal stance phase(p<.05). These finding can be utilized (a) as a reference for kinetic data of gait analysis in normal subjects, and (b) as an aide in evaluating and treating patients who have problems relating to gait.

• The Research Journal of the Costume Culture
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.290-299
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• 2014

This research sought to analyze the characteristics of breast movement at the treadmill activity levels. It also examined the effect of wearing a sports bra in reducing breast displacement. The subjects for the data collection were females in their 20s (n=2) with C-cup size breast. The experimental conditions were three different moving speeds (4 km/h, jogging: 7 km/h, and sprinting: 10 km/h) and two types of sports bras. Three dimensional breast displacement was measured. The displacement of the right nipple point was measured with a 3D motion analyzer. The results show that the breasts were greatly displaced from the walking speed (4 km/h) when subjects did not wear any bra. Whereas their breast displacement distance decreased remarkably when they wore sports bras. The nipple point moved 42~44 mm in the vertical direction at walking speed with naked condition. But it was reduced by 80% after wearing sports bras. When subjects running (7 km/h, 10 km/h) without any bra, the nipple point moved 122~141 mm. However it was reduced by 60~70% when they wore sports bras. The apartment time (time delay) between at the highest point of the upper body and the nipple was 0.25 seconds at the running speeds (7 km/h, 10 km/h) without wearing any bra. After wearing sports bras, the time delay was cut to 0.06~0.12 seconds. These results implies that without wearing any bra the skin surrounding the breasts might be seriously pulled at running activity. The functional sports bra suppress breast movement. It might prevent the sagging of breasts by preventing the damage of the Cooper's ligaments.

• Korean Journal of Applied Biomechanics
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.245-255
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• 2009

The purpose of this study is to analyzed the coordination of lower limb of elderly women who experienced a fall to present basic information for sports science and to deal with the factors that make elderly women fall more effectively. Twenty elderly women were divided into two groups of 10. The mechanisms of balancing lower limb during walk and differences were compared and analyzed using motion analysis and electromyography. The findings of this study are as follows. The first, walking patterns of these women were unstable as their hip joints did not provide sufficient support because of aging. Second, the left and right knee joints showed different walking patterns. The third, the motions of ankle joints became abnormal with increased age. As for the activation of major lower limb muscles, rectus fermois muscle and biceps fermois muscle contracted more to prevent the bending of knees and moved forward while anterior tibial muscle and inner gastrocnemius muscle were demanded highly during walk and the rate of plantar flexion was reduced.

• Journal of Korean Medicine Rehabilitation
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.203-217
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• 2020

The aim of this study was to propose our rehabilitation protocol involving Korean medicine for patients with patellar fracture and report its effectiveness. Further, for the same patellar fracture patients, we created different protocols for those who underwent surgical treatment and those who required conservative treatment. Among patients who received inpatient treatment at our hospital for three years from August 2017 to August 2020, we included three patients who underwent surgical treatment for patellar fracture and one patient who required conservative treatment for patellar fracture. The degree of improvement of the patients was evaluated using physical examination findings of the knee joint, numeric rating scale, pain disability index, Lysholm knee score, and walking state. After each treatments, we observed that the range of motion of the knee joint, numeric rating scale, pain disability index, Lysholm knee score, and walking state improved in the patient groups. Even with the same patellar fracture, we observed that different rehabilitation treatments involving Korean medicine should be applied to patients who underwent surgical treatment and those who required conservative treatment. However, further studies are needed to design a rehabilitation protocol involving Korean medicine.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.22 no.6 s.171
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• pp.213-221
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• 2005

An insole type local shear force measurement system was developed and local shear stresses in the foot were measured during level walking. The shear force transducer based on the magneto-resistive principle, was a rigid 3-layer circular disc. Sensor calibrations with a specially designed calibration device showed that it provided relatively linear sensor outputs. Shear transducers were mounted on the locations of four metatarsal heads and heel in the insole. Sensor outputs were amplified, decorded in the bluetooth transmission part and then transferred to PC. In order to evaluate the developed system, both shear and plantar pressure measurements, synchronized with the three-dimensional motion analysis system, were performed on twelve young healthy male subjects, walking at their comfortable speeds. The maximum peak pressure during gait was 5.00kPa/B.W at the heel. The time when large local shear stresses were acted correlated well with the time of fast COP movements. The anteroposterior shear was dominant near the COP trajectory, but the mediolateral shear was noted away from the COP trajectory. The vector sum of shear stresses revealed a strong correlation with COP movement velocity. The present study will be helpful to select the material and to design of foot orthoses and orthopedic shoes for diabetic neuropathy or Hansen disease.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Intelligent Systems
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• v.17 no.5
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• pp.640-647
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• 2007

This paper presents a joint controller for a humanoid robot based on genetic algorithm. h humanoid robot has basically instability during walking because it isn't fixed on the ground. Moreover nonlinearities of the joints increase its instability. If one of them isn't satisfied, the robot may fall down at the ground during walking. To attack one of those problems, joint controller is proposed. It can perform tracking control preciously and reduce the effect of nonlinearities by gear, limitation of the input voltage, coulomb friction and so on. This controller is based on fuzzy-sliding mode controller (FSMC) and compensator and control gains are searched by a proposed genetic algorithm. It can reduce the effect by nonlinearities. Also, to improve the tracking performance, the proposed controller has motion controller. From the given controller, a humanoid robot can moved more preciously. Here, all the processes are investigated through simulations and it is verified experimentally in a real joint system for a humanoid robot.