Musculoskeletal modeling in sport

Recently musculoskeletal modelling approaches are gaining interest in the scientific community thanks to their ability to provide knowledge of the internal loads acting on the human body such as jointloading and muscle forces which could not be directly measured unless through invasive methods. These models are composed of rigid bodies. Muscles are included in the model as actuators able to contract and provide the joint torques necessary to accelerate the segments, so generating the body movement. The processing pipeline to obtain musculoskeletal models using a rigid multibody skeletal structure will be described. Direct and indirect methods will be briefly illustrated as well as neuromusculoskeletal models which integrate neuromuscular control and musculoskeletal modeling. A few examples of different applications in the sport domain will be described and in particular a novel 6 DOF knee model purposely devised for deep squat motion.