Hierarchical Optimization for Personalized Hand and Wrist Musculoskeletal Modeling and Motion Estimation

Surface electromyography (sEMG) driven musculoskeletal models are promising to be applied in the field of human-computer interaction. However, due to the individual-specific physiological characteristics, generic models often fail to provide accurate motion estimation. This study optimized the general model to build a personalized model and improve the accuracy of motion estimation.

Inspired by the coupling effect of wrist/hand movement, a hierarchical optimization approach for personalizing musculoskeletal models (HOPE-MM) is proposed, which aligns with the physiological characteristics of the human wrist and hand. To verify the effectiveness of personalized musculoskeletal model, single joint motions and simultaneous joint motions are estimated. In addition, Sobol sensitivity analysis is conducted to identify the key parameters of musculoskeletal model, providing guidance for model simplification.

The mean pearson correlation coefficient between the predicted joint angles and the measured joint angles are 0.95 0.03 and 0.93 0.01 for simultaneous wrist and metacarpophalangeal (MCP) joint movements, respectively, which have a significant improvement compared with the state-of-the-art works. By optimizing only the key parameters including tendon slack length, maximal isometric force and optimal fiber length, the performances of simplified model are comparable to the full-parameter model.

These results provide insights into the effects of muscle-tendon parameters on musculoskeletal model, and musculoskeletal models personalized using hierarchical optimization methods can improve the accuracy of motion estimates.

These findings facilitate the clinical application of musculoskeletal models in rehabilitation and robotic control.