Acte de congrès

Are 21 markers too much to define a body COM

during quiet standing ?

Prince F., Termoz N., Corriveau H., Raîche M., Roy Y., Hébert R., Patla A.E.,
and Winter D.A.

Présenté au prochain

Symposium de recherche de la société Internationale de Posture et de

Locomotion

Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, Juillet 1999

 Are 21 markers too much to define a body COM during quiet standing?
Prince F1,2, Termoz N1, Corriveau H2, Raîche M2, Roy Y2, Hébert R2, Patla AE3 and Winter, DA3
1
Department of Kinesiology, University of Montreal, QC, Canada
2
Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Sherbrooke, QC, Canada.
3
Department of Kinesiology, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, ONT, Canada

Introduction
Evaluation of postural control during quiet standing is now becoming a more common task performed in
clinical settings. With the more demanding financial efficacy of health care system, a postural test must
not be too time consuming and must give the most accurate results to help the clinician to set the best
treatment for a given patient. The use of 21 markers has been reported to calculate a good estimate of the
total Centre of Mass (COM)1. To carefully install 21 markers on the body, this takes at least 20 minutes !
The objective of this research is to modify the COM model from 21 markers by reducing the number of
marker and find what is the minimum number and their specific location to estimate the body COM. The
validity of a rigid body during quiet standing will also be verified.
Methods
Twelve healthy elderly (6 women, 6 men) participated in this study. Their average age was 72 years
(sd:5.5y), their average mass was 67.6 kg (sd:17kg) and their average height was 1.62 m (sd:.11m). The
gold standard was set with a total of 21 infrared light emitting diodes attached bilaterally to anatomical
landmarks and defining a 14-segment model. Three OPTOTRAKâ sensors recorded marker displacement
at 20 HZ. Subjects stood for 120 seconds with their feet side by side at pelvis width. Two COM models, a
6-marker (COM6) and 4-marker (COM4) model were compared to the gold standard of 21 markers
(COM21). The root mean square (RMS) errors of both models (i.e. COM21-COM6 and COM21-COM4)
were calculated for the COM displacement in both antero-posterior (A/P) and medio-lateral (M/L)
directions. Correlation between COM4, COM6 and COM21 were performed. Angles between the lower
and upper body were also recorded in order to test the hypothesis that the body during quiet standing is
rigid and is acting like an inverted pendulum.
Results and Discussion
The Table 1 shows that the error between the 21-marker model and the 6-marker model is very small (<.3
mm) in both A/P and M/L directions. The error reaches in average .52 mm in the M/L plane for the
comparison of COM4 with COM21. Correlation was almost perfect (≅1) while the angle between the
lower and upper limbs was very stable showing good rigidity during quiet standing.

COM21-COM6 Correlation (r) COM21-COM4 Correlation (r) Rigidity (RMS o)

A/P .15 (.08) 1.00 (.00) .27 (.16) 1.00 (.00) .11 (.05)
M/L .28 (.16) .99 (.01) .52 (.15) 1.00 (.01) .05 (.02)
Table 1. RMS Error (in mm, sd in parentheses) between the 21-marker model and the COM6 & COM4
models. Rigidity angles (RMS in o) between the upper and lower body during 120 s of quiet standing.

In conclusion, using 6 markers (2 shoulders, 2 hips, 2 ankles) is sufficient to get a good estimate of the total
body COM with error < .28mm. A four-marker model (2 shoulders, 2 ankles) is also giving good results
(error < .52mm) and high correlation with COM21. The low variation in angle limb confirms the
hypothesis of rigidity between lower and upper body during quiet standing.
References
1. Winter, D.A. Prince, F. Powell, C. et Frank, J. (1996). J Neurophysiol. 75: 2334-2343.
Acknowledgements
This research was funded by the Medical Research Council of Canada (MRC Grant MT4343). The
«Fonds de la recherche en santé du Québec» (FRSQ) is also acknowledged for the scholarships
awarded to FP, HC and RH.