Study on motion measurement of human upper limb based on electromagnetic tracking system

The measurement and analysis of human motion is widely used in rehabilitation, athletics, ergonomics, diagnosis, bionics and computer graphics etc. We have developed a motion measurement and analysis system for human upper limb based on Polhemus¿ electromagnetic tracking system in this paper. According to the skeleton structure of human, the joint coordinate systems were built in shoulder, elbow and wrist joint. Then put forward an improved algorithm to calculate motion parameters of upper limb based on above-mentioned model, and successfully programmed the algorithm with Visual C++ which can calculate the range of seven DOF in motion with data collected by the electromagnetic sensors. Finally, basic actions of human arm in ADLs were measured using this system, and the range of seven DOF in motion were got. The test shows it is an accurate and easy way for motion measurement of upper limb.