Biomechanical simulation of Pediatric Exo

About 1 in 345 children in the United States have been identified with CP, according to 2010 estimates from CDC's ADDM Network. It is essential to aid children impacted by Cerebral Palsy impacted by crouch gait to be able to walk in a more effective manner and to avoid further damage on their joints. To do so, it is important to recognize how a brace must function to ensure the user is able to walk with the correct joint angles and torque. One method of doing so is a biomechanical simulation using the software OpenSim. Opensim allows the import of various exoskeletal models obtained by scanning individuals in real life into the software and conduct simulations using that model to obtain certain values as outputs. These outputs can then be applied to developing the brace itself. The method of doing so includes a few steps using the tools in OpenSim: The scaling tools fit the model to experimental markers obtained from an experiment with children with CP. Inverse Kinematics allows the gait cycle to be observed by allowing the model to walk displaying crouch gait. The RRA tool removes any error causing residuals. The CMC tool computes muscle level excitation to derive joint angles for the exo with the device. Forward Dynamics runs the entire gait cycle with the external loads. This helps obtaining outputs such as joint angles that can be useful in bettering the device to optimize the needs of the user.