Mechanisms associated with altering synergistic behaviour of skeletal muscle

这项研究计划的主要重点是提供有关躯干肌肉活动和躯干运动的客观信息，以帮助制定下腰损伤/疼痛的损伤预防、康复和治疗计划。与腰背损伤相关的巨大经济负担，其中许多发生在职业环境中，由于其对个人和社会的影响，需要关注。腰背部的许多问题与特定的疾病或物理结构(如椎间盘)的损伤无关，而与肌肉功能的变化有关。因此，了解肌肉如何协同工作来完成任务或保护脊椎，对许多领域都很重要。首先，在许多职业中，腰部的解剖结构可能会受到损伤，改变任务的设计依赖于良好的人体工程学评估，这在许多情况下意味着我们必须知道肌肉受到的压力，以及如何改变这种压力以降低腰部受伤的风险。其次，在临床环境中，如果肌肉受到腰痛的影响，我们需要能够准确地检测到这些变化，并使用良好的诊断和监测技术来监测这些变化。第三，这些信息可用于改进康复和治疗方案的设计。我的研究项目试图了解人们在执行不同任务时背部和腹部肌肉之间的关系。我们知道，肌肉改变了腰痛患者的活动模式，但改变这些模式的因素是什么呢？这项拟议的工作将开始确定这些模式是如何改变的，方法是观察一些不同的因素，包括任务何时改变，人何时疲劳，何时人有腰伤。我们记录大量肌肉的电活动模式，并测量背部的运动方式。我们有一种新的方法，可以让我们研究不同肌肉之间的所有关系，它增加了我们对肌肉如何协同工作的理解。长期目标是减少复发和新发的腰背损伤。

The major focus of this research program is to provide objective information on trunk muscle activity and trunk motion that can be used to help develop injury prevention, rehabilitation and treatment programs for low back injury/pain. The huge economic burden associated with low back injuries, many of which occur in occupational settings, requires attention given its impact on the individual and society. Many problems with the low back that are not related to a specific disease or injury to a physical structure such as the disc are related to changes in the muscle function. Thus understanding how the muscles work together to perform a task or to protect the spine is important to a number of areas. First in many occupations anatomical structures in the low back can be injured and altering the design of tasks relies on good ergonomic assessments which in many instances means we have to know what stresses are placed on the muscles and how could this be altered to reduce the risk of low back injuries. Secondly in the clinical setting if the muscles are affected by low back pain we need to be able to accurately detect those changes and monitor those changes using good diagnostic and monitoring techniques. Thirdly this information can then be used to improve the design of rehabilitation and treatment programs. My research program attempts to understand the relationship amongst muscles of the back and abdomen while people perform different tasks. We know that the muscles have altered patterns of activity in those that have low back pain, but what are the factors that alter these patterns. The proposed work will begin to determine how these are patterns are altered by looking at a number of different factors including when the task is changed, when the person is fatigued, and when the person has a low back injury. We record electrical activity patterns from a large number of muscles as well as measure how the back moves. We have a novel approach that allows us to study all of the relationships among the various muscles and it has increased our understanding of how the muscles work together. The long term goal is to reduce low back injuries both recurrent and new.