• The Journal of Korea Robotics Society
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.48-54
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• 2010

Ankle-foot orthosis with a pneumatic rubber actuator, which is intended for the assistance and the enhancement of ankle muscular activities was developed. In this study, the effectiveness of the system was investigated during plantarflexion motion of ankle joint. To find a effectiveness of the system, the subjects performed maximal voluntary isokinetic plantarflexion contraction on a Biodex-dynamometer. Plantarfexion torque of the ankle joint is assisted by subject's soleus muscle that is generated when ankle joint do plantarflexion motion. We used the muscular stiffness signal of a soleus muscle for feedback control of ankle-foot orthosis as physiological signal. For measurement of this signal, we made the muscular stiffness force sensor. We compared a muscular stiffness force of a soleus muscle between with feedback control and without it and a maximal plantarflexion torque between not wearing a ankle-foot orthosis, without feedback control wearing it and with feedback control wearing it in each ten elderly adults. The experimental result showed that a muscular stiffness force of a soleus muscle with feedback control was reduced and plantarflexion torque of an ankle joint only wearing ankle-foot orthosis was reduced but a plantarflexion torque with feedback control was increased. The amount of a increasing with feedback control is more higher than the amount of a decreasing only wearing it. Therefore, we confirmed the effectiveness of the developed ankle-foot orthosis with feedback control.

• The Journal of Industrial Distribution & Business
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• v.8 no.7
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• pp.63-70
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• 2017

Purpose - Due to the lack of physical activities and the increase of sedentary behaviors such as screen time, the health condition for contemporaries has been deteriorating. This study is designed to investigate how the use of worktable or tools unfit for body and sedentary behaviors can exercise influence on muscular skeletal disease and how it has an impact on lowering work efficiency and the quality of life with the medium of the muscular skeletal disease. Research design, data, and methodology - The research has developed a questionnaire with 5 hypothesis. The questionnaires were also made by interview and E-mail. 350 copies of questionnaires were distributed and 315 questionnaire were used for the analysis as valid data responses. SPSS ver.22.0 were used and made Cronbach's and reliability test, correlation, Baron & α Kenny 3 step mediated regression analysis. Results - The research has found that living environment factors have positive effect on the occurrence of musculosketal disease. Particularly, repeated use of unfit worktable or tools has a positive effect on the muscular skeletal disorder. And sedentary lifestyle also has a positive effect on the disease. The musculoskeletal disease caused by living environment has a positive impact on lowering the work efficiency. This study has also showed that the muscular skeletal disease has mediated the relationship between the living environment factors and the decrease of work efficiency due to musculoskeletal disease. The musculoskeletal disorders can effect the decrease of the quality of life as well, for the decrease of work efficiency has a positive effect on lowering the quality of life. Conclusions - Sedentary lifestyles, the use of worktable unfit for body, and the repeated use of a tool have caused the increase of muscular-skeletal diseases, and reduction of productivity as well as the hight cost of medical treatment for our contemporaries. Understanding the cause of disease morbidity, finding ways to prevent the disease, and educating people about them would contribute not only to improvement of individual health but also to the advancement of welfare for all.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.139-148
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• 2018

PURPOSE: This study compared the effects of indoor and outdoor environmental changes on the activity of the major lower limb muscles and walking factors in people 40-50 years and those aged older than 70 years. METHODS: Ten middle-aged people in their forties (age:$44.2{\pm}2.7$, BMI:$21.8{\pm}1.8$) and 10 elderly aged more than 70 years (age:$76.4{\pm}5.9$, BMI:$22.2{\pm}1.9$) with a normal walking ability were included. The participants walked 100 m both indoors and outdoors at their own speed. Using a 3D motion analyzer and EMG, the walking speed, angle of the ankle and activity changes of the lower limb muscles were compared. RESULTS: Significant differences in walking speed and peak-plantar flexion angle were observed between the two groups (p<.05). The muscular activity of the gastrocnemius muscle (GCM) was significantly different outdoors in the swing phase between the two groups (p<.05). In the people aged in their forties, the muscular activity of the rectus femoris (RF) was significantly higher outdoors than indoors (p<.05). In the elderly, however, the muscular activity of the RF was lower outdoors than indoors (p<.05). When compared to those in there forties, the muscular activity of the outdoor RF significantly decreased in the elderly group (P<.05). The muscular activity of the biceps femoris (BF) in the elderly decreased significantly outdoors compared to indoors (p<.05). CONCLUSION: For the elderly, increasing the exposure to the new environments or focusing on the performance of repeated movements for gradual speed control and precise movements is required to maintain normal gaits and movements that are less affected by environmental changes.

• Korean Journal of Applied Biomechanics
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.301-308
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• 2014

The purpose of this study was to determine whether there are significant differences in kinematic variables and muscle activities of the thumb between two smartphone holding techniques. Twelve right handed university students(age $25.4{\pm}3.9yrs$, height $176.2{\pm}5.1cm$, weight $75.8{\pm}11.4kg$, hand length $19.2{\pm}1.1cm$) who have no musculoskeletal disorder were recruited as the subjects and had experience in using a smartphone for more than one year. Maximum joint angle, angular velocity, muscular activities were determined for each trial. For each dependent variable, paired t-test was used to determine whether there were significant differences between one hand (OH) and two hands ([TH], ${\rho}$ <.05). The results of this study showed that there were no significant differences between OH and TH in the maximum joint angle of the thumb. The angular velocity of each joint was not statistically significant between OH and TH. The statistical analysis revealed that the main effect of the smartphone holding conditions was significant in the peak normalized muscular activities of FDI and APL. Although smartphone holding technique doesn't affect on mobility and movement of the thumb joint, it may affect on active degree of the thumb and the upper extremity in directly and indirectly.

• Proceedings of the Korean Operations and Management Science Society Conference
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• 1992.04b
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• pp.358-363
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• 1992

A two-dimensional static biomechanical model of lower extremity in the seated posture was developed to assess muscular activities of lower extremity required for a variety of foot pedal operations. Muscle forces of the model were predicted using the double linear optimization scheme. For the model validation, three subjects performed the experiments which measured EMG activities of six lower extremity muscles. Predicted muscle forces were compared with the corresponding rectified intergrated EMG amplitudes and it showed reasonable results.

• The korean journal of orthodontics
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.233-246
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• 1994

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the difference of muscular activities of the tongue and lip muscles between anterior open-bite and normal occlusion during various function. Thirty eight subjects of 12.1-39.6 years were employed in this study : Eighteen subjects were anterior open-bites and tweenty subjects were normal occlusions. During rest position, maximum effort of lip sealing, command swallow of saliva and sucking & swallowing of juice, the electromyographic datas of the genioglossus, superior longitudinal muscle of tongue, upper and lower orbicularis oris were recorded and integrated with Medelec MS 25 electromyographic machine. Lateral cephalometric radiographs were taken on all subjects for the analysis of tongue posture and size. All data were recored and statistically processed. The findings of this study can be summerized as follows : 1. During the rest position, muscular activity of tongue was higher than that of lip muscle in open-bite, but no difference in normal occlusion group. 2. During the swallowing of juice, the activity of orbicularis oris was higher than that of genioglossus in open-bite. But the normal occusion was showed higher activity of tongue during the swallowing of juice. 3. The open-bite, compared to the normal occlusion, had higher value of tongue muscle activity during the rest position. 4. Compared to normal occlusion group, the open-bite had higher value of lip muscle activity during the sucking and swallowing of juice. 5. During the command swallow of saliva, the normal occlusion was showed harmonious swallowing pattern, but the open-bite showed much variation and disharmony in muscular contraction sequence, tended to absent of lip muscle activity. 6. At the lateral cephalometric radiographs, compared to the normal occlusion, the open-bite was showed lower tongue posture. But no difference was found in intermaxillary space. It is suggested that the open-bite, compared to the normal occlusion, had higher muscular activity of tongue during the rest position and various functions, showed lower tongue posture on the lateral cephalogram. In the development of anterior open-bite malocclusion, these factors may be an etiologic factor.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2007.11a
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• pp.501-502
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• 2007

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2007.06a
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• pp.689-690
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• 2007

• Journal of the Korean Society of Physical Medicine
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.129-136
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• 2018

PURPOSE: This Study compared the level of activation of the muscles around the shoulder at the time of abduction through Pilates breathing and regular breathing by using quantified biofeedback. METHODS: Experiment was conducted on 25 healthy males and females in the age bracket of 20's~30's as the subjects. The level of activation of muscles displayed at the time of Pilates breathing were measured at intercostal (InC) muscle, transverse abdominis (TrA) muscle, internal oblique (IO) muscle and external oblique (EO) muscle by using surface electromyogram (EMG) and were provided as biofeedback. Moreover, the changes in the level of muscular activation at sternocleidomastoid (SCM) muscle, upper trapezius (UT) muscle and Deltoid (Del) muscle, which are the muscles around the shoulder, at the time of abduction of shoulder during Pilates breathing and regular breathing were measured. RESULTS: When abduction of shoulder is executed through Pilates breathing, the level of muscular activation of UT muscle was $11.56{\pm}7.10%$ at the time of exhaling of Pilates breathing and $17.54{\pm}9.57%$ at the time of exhaling of regular breathing. Del muscle also displayed lowered level of muscular activation at the time of Pilates breathing with $12.88{\pm}5.80%$ during inhaling and $15.14{\pm}5.49%$ during exhaling. CONCLUSION: In conclusion, the results could be interpreted as indicating that the muscle activities of upper trapezius and deltoid muscle were decreased based on Pilates breathing more than those on regular breathing.

• Proceedings of the ESK Conference
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• 1992.10a
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• pp.46-53
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• 1992

Finger movements in the sagittal plane mainly consist of flexion and extension about the metacarpophalangeal(MCP) and proximal interphalangeal(PIP) joints. A kinematic finger model was developed with the assumption of constant tendon moment arms. Equations of static equilibrium were derived for the finger model using the principle of virtual work. Equations of static equilibrium for the finger model were indeterminate since only three equations were available for five unknown variables(forces). The number of variables was reduced based on information on muscular activities in finger movements. Then the amounts of forces which muscles exerted to maintain static equilibrium against external loads were computed from the equilibrium equations. The muscular forces were expressed mathematically as functions of finger positions, tendon moment arms, lengths of phalanges, and the magnitude and direction of external load. The external finger strength were computed using the equations of muscular forces and anatomical data. Experiments were performed to measure finger strengths. Measurements were taken in combinations of four finger positions and four directions of force exertions. Validation of the finger models and of procedure to estimate finger strengths was done by comparing the results of computations and experiments. Significang differences were found between the predicted and measured finger strengths. However, the trends of finger strengths with respect to finger positions were similar inboth the predicted and measured. These findings indicate that the finger model and the procedure to predict finger strengths were correctly developed.