Bipedal spring-damper-mass model reproduces external mechanical power of human walking

Previous authors have long investigated the behavior of different models of passive walkers with stiff or compliant limbs. We investigated a model of bipedal mechanism whose limba are provided with damping and elastic elements. This model is designed for walking along an inclined plane, in order to make up the energy lost due to the damping element with that gained thanks to the lowering the CoM. The proposed model is hence able to steadily walk. In particular we investigated the stability of this model by using the Poincaré return map for different dynamical configurations. Then we compared the estimated external mechanical power with experimental data from literature in order to validate the model. Results show that the model is able to reproduce the main features of the time course of the external mechanical power during the gait cycle. Accordingly, dissipative elements coupled with limbs' compliant behavior represent a suitable paradigm, to mimic human locomotion.