An energy 'sources' and 'fractions' approach to the mechanical energy expenditure problem--III. Mechanical energy expenditure reduction during one link motion

Abstract

Mechanical energy economy and transformation during one link motion are analyzed on the basis of the theory developed in the previous publications (parts I and II of this series, J. Biomechanics 19, 287-300). The 'compensation coefficient' characterizing mechanical energy economy is introduced. The attempts to estimate MEE using only energy curves and neglecting the powers of real sources of energy implicitly lead to replacement of real force and moment systems by the systems reduced to the centers of mass. But such an unintentional substitution of imaginary sources for real ones, specifically, the reduction of forces acting on the link to the equivalent system, changes estimates of mechanical energy expenditure (MEE). That is why the methods of calculating MEE economy based on the determination of so-called 'quasi-mechanical' work (the sum of the kinetic and potential energy increases per one cycle of motion) are not correct. There are two mechanisms to reduce the MEE using the antiphase fluctuations (corresponding to energy transformations) of the (a) rotational and translational fractions of the total energy (at the expense of the F-sources); (b) potential and kinetic energies (at the expense of the mg-source).