Angular Moment and Corrective Forces in Human Walking Processes: Sensor and Actuator Analysis

Abstract

Taking into account the dynamics of a human body in its daily movement, one can study the forces that are generated in its variations with respect to a normal walk. These forces can be reduced, generating an opposite force through some device if one takes into account that their magnitude is not very large in some cases. This paper outlines results obtained from the sensorization of a human body in uniform movement, and changes in angular velocity and moment of a force produced by different inflections in normal movement. The aim was to calculate the moment of a force thanks to the measured angular velocity, and then study the opposition to this movement by using the produced reaction by the conservation of angular moment (gyroscopic effect). The study was carried out through the positioning of different sensors that were placed to analyze points of interest of the movement. In this study, we were able to appreciate changes in the variables to study up to two orders of magnitude at the generated moment, when the movement went from being uniform, which is equivalent to a walk, to the situation of an inflection, for example, a fall or bending over. With the collected data, the prediction of a fall could be studied and perhaps avoided.