Removing motion artifacts from mechanomyographic signals: an innovative filtering method applied to human movement analysis

Mechanomyography (MMG) is a promising tool for measuring muscle activity in the field but its sensitivity to motion artifacts limits its application. In this study, we proposed an adaptative filtering method for MMG accelerometers based on the complete ensemble empirical mode decomposition, with adaptative noise and spectral fuzzy entropy, to isolate motions artefacts from the MMG signal in dynamic conditions. We compared our method with the traditional band-pass filtering technique, demonstrating better results concerning motion recomposition for deltoid and erector spinae muscles (R² = 0.907 and 0.842). Thus, this innovative method allows the filtering of motion artifacts dynamically in the 5-20 Hz bandwidth, which is not achievable with traditional method. However, the interpretation of accelerometric MMG signals from the trunk and lower-limb muscles during walking or running should be approached with great caution as impact-related accelerations are still present, though their exact quantity still needs to be quantified.