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Updated: Jul 14, 2026

Determining The Electromyographic Fatigue Threshold Following a Single Visit Exercise Test
Published on: July 27, 2015
[Response of electroencephalography to isometric exercise-induced local muscle fatigue]
1Institute of Psychology, Zhejiang Sci-tech University, Hangzhou 310018, China.
Objective:
To explore the response of electroencephalography (EEG) signal to biceps brachii fatiguing induced by sustained isometric (non-maximal) voluntary contraction (non-MVC) and to lay a foundation for effective and reliable fatigue evaluation system and for understanding fatigue mechanisms.
Methods:
Ten male undergraduates performed two different isometric fatiguing tasks with the elbow flexion muscles under a load of 5 and 10 kg respectively, and synchronously EEG signals were collected from scalp. Then amplitude, spectral and Lempel-Ziv complexity C(n) of EEG were calculated.
Results:
The average EEG(AEEG) increased while the average mean power frequency (MPF) and complexity of EEG decreased in muscle fatigue. Furthermore, this phenomenon was distributed evenly across the entire scalp, but load only influenced AEEG, MPF and C(n) at Fz.
Conclusion:
AEEG of EEG increases generally while MPF and C(n) increase generally during local muscle fatigue. This pattern of EEG reflects the central mechanism of muscle fatigue. AEEG, MPF and C(n) at prefrontal area show load dependence.
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