A method for detecting and editing MUPTs contaminated by false classification errors during EMG signal decomposition

A robust method for detecting motor unit potential trains (MUPTs) contaminated with false classification errors (FCEs) during EMG signal decomposition and then removing the FCEs from a contaminated train is presented. Using motor unit (MU) firing pattern information provided by each MUPT, the developed algorithm first determines whether a given train is contaminated by high number of FCEs and needs to be edited. For contaminated MUPTs, the method uses both MU firing pattern and motor unit potential (MUP) shape information to detect MUPs that were erroneously assigned to the train (i.e., represent FCEs). For the simulated data used in this study contaminated MUPTs could be detected with 88.7% accuracy. For a given contaminated MUPT, the algorithm on average correctly detected 83.4% of the FCEs and left 93.4% of the correctly assigned MUPs. The accuracy of the MUPs classified to a MUPT was estimated to be 92.1% on average.