Assessment of Lower Limb Muscle Activation During Gait Assisted by a Cable-Actuated Exoskeleton

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Abstract
This study aims to evaluate the modifications that occur in the neuromuscular system during a walking assistance device through a wearable exoskeleton or exosuit. We propose to study the muscle activations and forces obtained by inverse dynamic analysis at different levels of exosuit actuation and anchor points, with the aim of obtaining an actuation map that will allow us to optimize both the design and the actuation of the exosuit. In addition, metabolic probes were calculated to estimate the influence of the exosuit on energy consumption. The results suggest a reduction in the muscle activations and forces exerted by the hamstring muscles of the actuated leg, especially the semitendinosus muscle and biceps femoris, compared to a non-actuated gait. In contrast, the muscle strength of the other muscles remains unchanged. Our results suggest that the configuration at 70% of femur length shows better results in reducing metabolic cost compared to the other configurations.

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