A simulation study to investigate an extension to the point cluster technique

Joint kinematics are an important and widely utilized metric in quantitative human movement analysis. Typically, trajectory data for skin-mounted markers are collected using stereophotogrammetry, sometimes referred to as optical motion capture, and processed using various mathematical models to estimate joint kinematics (e.g., angles). Among the various sources of noise in optical motion capture data, soft tissue artifacts (STAs) remain a critical source of error. This study investigates the performance of the point cluster technique (PCT), an extension of the PCT using perturbation theory (PCT-PT), and singular value decomposition least squares (SVD-LS) method (as a reference) for 100 different marker configurations on the thigh and shank during treadmill walking. This study provides additional evidence that the PCT method is significantly limited by the underlying mathematical constraints governing its optimization process. Furthermore, the results suggest the PCT-PT method outperforms the PCT method across all performance metrics for both body segments during the entire gait cycle. For position-based metrics, the PCT-PT method provides better estimates than the SVD-LS method for the thigh during majority of the stance phase and provides comparable estimates for the shank during the entire gait cycle. For knee angle estimates, the PCT-PT method provides equivalent results as the SVD-LS method.