Exploring the high-dimensional structure of muscle redundancy via subject-specific and generic musculoskeletal models

Abstract Subject-specific and generic musculoskeletal models are the computational instantiation of hypotheses, and stochastic techniques help explore their validity. We present two such examples to explore the hypothesis of muscle redundancy. The first addresses the effect of anatomical variability on static force capabilities for three individual cat hindlimbs, each with seven kinematic degrees of freedom (DoFs) and 31 muscles. We present novel methods to characterize the structure of the 31-dimensional set of feasible muscle activations for static force production in every 3-D direction. We find that task requirements strongly define the set of feasible muscle activations and limb forces, with few differences comparing individual vs. species-average results. Moreover, muscle activity is not smoothly distributed across 3-D directions. The second example explores parameter uncertainty during a flying disc throwing motion by using a generic human arm with five DoFs and 17 muscles to predict muscle fiber velocities. We show that the measured joint kinematics fully constrain the eccentric and concentric fiber velocities of all muscles via their moment arms. Thus muscle activation for limb movements is likely not redundant: there is little, if any, latitude in synchronizing alpha–gamma motoneuron excitation–inhibition for muscles to adhere to the time-critical fiber velocities dictated by joint kinematics. Importantly, several muscles inevitably exhibit fiber velocities higher than thought tenable, even for conservative throwing speeds. These techniques and results, respectively, enable and compel us to continue to revise the classical notion of muscle redundancy for increasingly more realistic models and tasks.