Informing the design of sports and exercise products for exercising women post pregnancy

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Women experience significant changes to their physiology and biomechanics as a result of pregnancy. This can include changes to foot structure (Segal et al. 2013), pelvic floor biomechanics (Easley et al. 2017), and joint laxity (Chu et al. 2019) which may hinder a return to exercise or sport for women. There is a growing trend for the development of female specific sports and exercise products, but it is unclear how suitable these are for women post pregnancy when exercising given the substantial changes they experience. The studentship will appeal to students interested in studying human-sport equipment interaction with a specific focus on females pre and post pregnancy. Initial studies will build on established research in the Sports Technology Institute with a focus on footwear design and gait analysis of pre to post pregnant females and sports bra design. The direction of the PhD is flexible and can be partially moulded to suit the strengths and interests of the successful candidate. It is intended that a variety of biomechanics data collection and analysis techniques will need to be used including motion analysis systems (Vicon/CODA), digital image correlation (GOM), force plates, electromyography, accelerometers and pressure analysis. There is also scope to use advanced analytic techniques to determine subject specific biomechanics requiring some existing experience of using software such as Matlab, R, Python or similar.