Biomimetic Neurostimulation for the Enhancement of Lower-Limb Explosive Performance: A Pilot Study

Background: Developing non-invasive bioengineering interventions to mitigate central fatigue remains a critical objective in applied physiology and sports medicine. This pilot study investigated a potential temporal association between a Natural Neurostimulation (NN) intervention and the short-term recovery of lower-limb explosive performance, utilizing a non-randomized, fixed-sequence design. Method: Athletes (N = 8) underwent pre- and post-exercise assessments under control (Day 1) and experimental NN (Day 2) conditions. Using a decoupled bilateral force-plate protocol, the study assessed lower-limb explosive performance recovery following upper-body loading. Results: Descriptive statistics demonstrated a mean Jump Height effect of 0.052 ± 0.034, with a 95% confidence interval (CI) [0.023, 0.081], and a mean Peak Power effect of 0.032 ± 0.035, with a 95% CI [0.002, 0.062]. For Jump Height, a paired-samples t-test comparing Day 1 and Day 2 retention coefficients revealed a statistically significant improvement (t = 4.284, p = 0.0036), indicating a very large intervention effect (Cohen's d_z = 1.515). Peak Power retention demonstrated a similarly significant improvement (t = 2.545, p = 0.0384), yielding a large effect size (Cohen's d_z = 0.900). Conclusions: The NN intervention was associated with statistically significant, large-magnitude improvements in both Jump Height and Peak Power retention coefficients following fatiguing exercise. While these findings suggest that the NN protocol may facilitate the short-term recovery of lower-limb explosive performance, the absence of randomization and a sham control precludes establishing a definitive causal relationship. Nevertheless, these preliminary results demonstrate the operational feasibility of the intervention, providing a clear methodological foundation for future fully powered, randomized controlled trials.