Reproducibility of Electromyography Signal Amplitude during Repetitive Dynamic Contraction

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study is to evaluate the fluctuation of signal amplitude during repetitive dynamic contraction based on surface electromyography(EMG). Background: The most previous studies were considered isometric muscle contraction and they were difference to smoothing window length by moving average filter. In practical, the human movement is dynamic state. Dynamic EMG signal which indicated as the nonstationary pattern should be analyzed differently compared with the static EMG signal. Method: Ten male subjects participated in this experiment, and EMG signal was recorded by biceps brachii, anterior/posterior deltoid, and upper/lower trapezius muscles. The subject was performed to repetitive right horizontal lifting task during ten cycles. This study was considered three independent variables(muscle, amplitude processing technique, and smoothing window length) as the within-subject experimental design. This study was estimated muscular activation by means of the linear envelope technique(LE). The dependent variable was set coefficient of variation(CV) of LE for each cycle. Results: The ANOVA results showed that the main and interaction effects between the amplitude processing technique and smoothing window length were significant difference. The CV value of peak LE was higher than mean LE. According to increase the smoothing window length, this study shows that the CV trend of peak LE was decreased. However, the CV of mean LE was analyzed constant fluctuation trend regardless of the smoothing window length. Conclusion: Based on these results, we expected that using the mean LE and 300ms window length increased reproducibility and signal noise ratio during repetitive dynamic muscle contraction. Application: These results can be used to provide fundamental information for repetitive dynamic EMG signal processing.