Although no cause-and-effect relationship has been established, this is the first study to show an association between hip abductor, adductor, and flexor muscle group strength imbalance and lower extremity overuse injuries in runners. Because most running injuries are multifaceted in nature, areas secondary to the site of pain, such as hip muscle groups exhibiting strength imbalances, must also be considered to gain favorable outcomes for injured runners. The addition of strengthening exercises to specifically identified weak hip muscles may offer better treatment results in patients with running injuries.

While mobility strategies are considered important in understanding selection pressures on individuals, testing hypotheses of such strategies requires high resolution datasets, particularly at intersections between morphology, ecology and energetics. Here we present data on interactions between morphology and energetics in regards to the cost of walking for reproductive women and place these data into a specific ecological context of time and heat load. Frontal loads (up to 16% of body mass), as during pregnancy and child-carrying, significantly slow the optimal and preferred walking speed of women, significantly increase cost at the optimal speed, and make it significantly more costly for women to walk with other people. We further show for the first time significant changes in the curvature in the Cost of Transport curve for human walking, as driven by frontal loads. The impact of these frontal loads on females, and the populations to which they belong, would have been magnified by time constraints due to seasonal changes in day length at high latitudes and thermoregulatory limitations at low latitudes. However, wider pelves increase both stride length and speed flexibility, providing a morphological offset for load-related costs. Longer lower limbs also increase stride length. Observed differences between preferred and energetically optimal speeds with frontal loading suggest that speed choices of women carrying reproductive loads might be particularly sensitive to changes in heat load. Our findings show that female reproductive costs, particularly those related to locomotion, would have meaningfully shaped the mobility strategies of the hominin lineage, as well as modern foraging populations.

Here, we argue that two key shifts in thinking are required to more clearly understand the selection pressures shaping pelvis evolution in female hominins: (1) the primary locomotor mode of female hominins was loaded walking in the company of others, and (2) the periodic gait of human walking is most effectively explained as a biomechanically controlled process related to heel-strike collisions that is tuned for economy and stability by properly-timed motor inputs (a model called dynamic walking). In the light of these two frameworks, the evidence supports differences between female and male upper-pelvic morphology being the result of the unique reproductive role of female hominins, which involved moderately paced, loaded walking in groups. Anat Rec, 300:764-775, 2017. V C 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

We redesigned our intermediate-level organismal physiology laboratory course to center on student-designed experiments in plant and human physiology. Our primary goals were to improve the ability of students to design experiments and analyze data. We assessed these abilities at the beginning and end of the semester by giving students an evaluation tool consisting of an experimental scenario, data, and four questions of increasing complexity. To control for nontreatment influences, the improvement scores (final minus initial score for each question) of students taking both the laboratory and the companion lecture course were compared with those of students taking the lecture course only. The laboratory + lecture group improved more than the lecture-only group for the most challenging question. This evidence suggests that our inquiry-based curriculum is achieving its primary goals. The evaluation tool that we developed may be useful to others interested in measuring experimental analysis abilities in their students.

For better understanding of the links between limb morphology and the metabolic cost of locomotion, we have characterized the relationships between limb length and shape and other functionally important variables in the straightened forelimbs and hindlimbs of a sample of 12 domestic dogs (Canis familiaris). Intra-animal comparisons show that forelimbs and hindlimbs are very similar (not significantly different) in natural pendular period (NPP), center-of-mass, and radius of gyration, even though they differ distinctly in mass, length, moment-of-inertia, and other limb proportions. The conservation of limb NPP, despite pronounced dissimilarity in other limb characteristics, appears to be the result of systematic differences in shape, forelimbs tending to be cylindrical and hindlimbs conical. Estimating limb NPP for other species from data in the literature on segment inertia and total limb length, we present evidence that the similarity between forelimbs and hindlimbs in NPP is generally true for mammals across a large size range. Limbs swinging with or near their natural pendular periods will maximize within-limb pendular exchange of potential and kinetic energy. As all four limbs of moderate- and large-size animals swing with the same period during walking, maximal advantage can be derived from the pendular exchange of energy only if forelimbs and hindlimbs are very similar in NPP. We hypothesize that an important constraint in the evolution of limb length and shape is the locomotor economy derived from forelimbs and hindlimbs of similar natural pendular period.

No abstract

Objectives To develop a pilot health coaching curriculum, investigate its effects on geriatric patient outcomes, and examine qualitative feedback by older patients and medical students to the curriculum. Methods A mixed methods study involving 29 first-year medical students randomly paired with 29 older adults with uncontrolled Type 2 diabetes was completed. Health-related quality of life (HRQoL), stage of change movement, diabetes knowledge, locus of control, body mass index (BMI), and glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c) were assessed. Focus groups were used to evaluate patients’ and medical students’ experiences. Results Patients’ HRQoL and stage of change for exercise improved significantly over time. There were no significant changes in stage of change for healthy diet and medication, diabetes knowledge, BMI, and HbA1c from baseline to end-of-study. Focus group data indicated positive responses by older patients and the medical students. Discussion A health coaching curriculum may improve patient outcomes and can provide medical students the skills needed to provide compassionate care for geriatric patients.

Functional morphologists have traditionally regarded cost of locomotion as an important influence on the design of locomotor structures. If cost of locomotion is an important constraint in the natural selection of these structures, it should be possible to show that animals differing in limb morphology also differ in their locomotor costs. In previous experiments on three species of cursorial mammals differing considerably in limb structure, no such differences were detected. Since the factors that determine the rate of energy consumption of a running animal are not well understood, we felt that the effect of limb morphology on cost could best be examined in a system in which only the inertial properties of limbs were varied while other factors remained constant. Consequently, we have measured changes in the rate of energy consumption of running human subjects produced by artificial alterations in limb inertial properties. Other variables that might influence cost have been controlled. We found that the cost of adding a given mass to the limbs is significantly greater than adding it to the centre of mass and that this effect becomes more pronounced as the limb loads are moved distally. Thus a clear effect of limb mass and its distribution on cost of locomotion has been demonstrated.