Lab 7

Simulation-Based Design to Prevent Ankle Injuries using an Active AFO

Objective
Rehabilitation robotics are providing new active devices to help train and
optimize movement. Orthotics for ankle injury prevention have traditionally
been passive devices, but what if you could create an active mode for landing?
We will add a torque motor at the ankle to model an active orthotic. Your
challenge will be to optimize the timing and activation level of the active
orthotic to prevent ankle inversion injury.

Damage to the
ligaments that
restrain ankle
inversion,
>25° correlates with
injury
 I. Advanced Design Challenge: Create an active orthotic

A. Explore the AFO model

1. Select File>Open Model... navigate to the ToyDropLanding folder and
select ToyLandingModel_activeAFO.osim.
2. Explore the model using the Navigator panel.
Task 1
a. What new forces have been added?
b.What degree of freedom is actively controlled by AFO?

B. Modify the active AFO torque profile

The default setting for the active AFO is ‘off’ and you will need to define when
the orthotic is active. To specify the torque produced by the active AFO and
run a forward simulation, we will use the Forward Tool, which allows
specification of additional settings:
1. Select Tools>Forward Dynamics.... This launches the Forward Dynamics
Tool.
2. Under the Main Settings tab, find the Input subsection.
3. Check the box for Solve for equilibrium for actuator states. This will
initialize the tendon and muscle fibers before starting the integration.
4. Set the Time range to process as 0 to 0.4.
5. Change the output Directory by adding \ActiveAFO to the end of the
displayed folder name; the resulting Directory should
be [Example_Dir]\ToyDropLanding\ActiveAFO.
6. In the Input Subsection, select the folder button next to Controls. Open the
file ActiveAFO_Controls.xml.
7. Select the small pencil button next to the Controls box to edit this controls file.
Under Select Excitations, check the box next to ActiveAFO and hit OK. This
will open the Excitation Editor which shows the excitation of a controller (in our
case, the activeAFO) with respect to time.
8. Change the excitation profile by moving the points in the Excitation Editor. To
select a point, hold down CTRL and click on the point (similarly you can select
multiple points by holding down CTRL and dragging the mouse over multiple
points). To change the value of the points, you can either drag them on the
 screen, or enter a value in the “Set selected points to” box. You can also add
or remove points. Click the “Help” button for more information.
9. Once you are done editing the excitation profile, select Save As and save to
an xml file called ActiveAFO_Edited.xml. Close the Excitation Editor.
10. On the Forward Dynamics set-up screen, make sure your edited Controls
file is selected: select the folder icon and choose your new controls file.
11. You can save your Forward Dynamics settings to re-use later (using load
command) by clicking on the Save... button and saving your settings (e.g.
setup_forward_activeAFO.xml).
12. Click Run. This will use the default options for all other settings. Since you
haven't specified an Initial State file, the tool will use the current pose of the
model in the GUI as the starting state for the simulation.
13. The model will animate during the forward simulation. You can Close the
tool window after you've clicked Run.
14. Once the simulation has completed, you can use the animation controls
above the view window to replay the motion.
15. Rename the new motion to "ActiveAFO". The results will be automatically
saved by the forward tool in the directory you specified above
([Example_Dir]\ToyDropLanding\ActiveAFO).
 Task 2
Your challenge is to create the optimal AFO for drop landing. Edit the
activation of the AFO and the stiffness to optimize your design. Your design
will be judged on the following criteria:
• Minimal AFO stiffness (for maximum comfort and low material costs)
• Smallest torque required from the active AFO (for a small, compact motor)
• Minimal amount of time the AFO is active (to maximize battery life)
• Prevent ankle injury (Assume that a neutral ankle position i.e. subtalar angle
= 0 is ideal).
Note: Plot the results for optimal point to activate AFO with parameters
operating ranges and fill the table below:
Even Rolls - Stiffness (2-5 times of initial), Torque (50-90% of max), Activation
time (between 0-0.4 sec)
Odd Rolls - Stiffness (7-10 times of initial), Torque (10-40% of max), Activation
time (between 0-0.4 sec)
Optimal Point Stiffness Torque Time Subtalar angle

II. Analyze the effects of muscle co-activation

Individuals can modulate the stiffness of the ankle by co-activating muscles
in anticipation of landing. Thus, co-contraction of muscles, especially the
inverter and everter muscles, might reduce ankle inversion during landing. The
model comes equipped with two controllers that set the level of excitation
(control) of the inverter and everter muscles. These controllers are initially
disabled in the model. By enabling them, you can explore the effect of
increased muscle co-activity on ankle inversion during the drop-landing. The
co-activation controllers will operate in addition to the reflex controllers in
the model. The reflex controllers activate based on the stretch of the whole
muscle–tendon unit. The level of excitation of the muscle is proportional (via a
gain) to the rate that the whole muscle actuator is lengthening.

A. Explore the model's controllers and simulate with co-activation

1. If the original unassisted ToyLandingModel.osim is still loaded, make it
the current model by right-clicking on the model name in the Navigator panel
and choosing Make Current. Make sure your model is in the Default pose
(Coordinates>Poses>Default). If you closed the model, re-load it
using File>Open Model....
2. Go to the Navigator panel and find the list of the model's Controllers.
3. Locate the Reflexes controller. What is the current value of the controller
gain?
4. Find the co-activation controllers, R-inverter controls and R-everter
controls. These controllers are disabled by default (i.e., the "enabled" property
is false).
5. These controllers activate the specified muscles at a prescribed constant value
throughout the simulation. To see the prescribed control values, highlight R-
inverter controls or R-everter controls in the Navigator panel, then go to the
Properties panel and click on the "..." button next to the "ControlFunctions"
property. A tree view opens where you can navigate to the constants for each
of the inverter or everter muscles in the model.
6. Enable the R-inverter and R-everter controls by checking the "enabled"
property in each of these model components.
7. Run a forward simulation with the pre-activation controllers and add the results
to your plot.

Task 3 plot the optimal subtalar angle for the values given below and
compare with simple coactivation of muscles alone (with default
stiffness) and soft AFO ploted earlier (without coactivation).
Tanslational stiffness (3-6 times)
Even Rolls - Co-activation = 0.2 for Inverters, 0.5 for Everters
Odd Rolls - Co-activation = 0.3 for Inverters, 0.7 for Everters
Fill the table below:
Optimal Point Stiffness Inverter Everter Subtalar angle
Design Example
Reference
https://simtk-confluence.stanford.edu:8443/display/OpenSim/Simulation-
Based+Design+to+Prevent+Ankle+Injuries