The main results of this work are the contribution to find the following results: <br />• The most general GRB is made by an early emission (P-GRB or Proper-GRB), with a time-scale not larger than 1 or 2 seconds and an afterglow, whose light curve is characterized by an increasing phase followed by a peak and a decreasing phase. This peak has been identified with the long GRBs prompt emission. In this scenario short GRBs are not but P-GRB, while long GRBs present both a peak and a decreasing late time emission, which is the observed afterglow.<br />• A possible GRB/SuperNova connection is based on the process of induced gravitational collapse of a companion star of the black hole originating the GRB. <br />• A thermal distribution in the comoving frame of the expanding system is assumed for X and γ bands of the spectrum. This assumption leads to a natural bending of the late time light curves making not necessary the hypothesis of a beamed emission within a collimated jet from the inner engine, which has been introduced in literature essentially to reduce the energy requirements.

<p>Saab Aerosystems has a long tradition and a lot of competence in the field of flight simulation. Their ambition to broaden the market horizon has led to a discussion about also selling vehicle simulation solutions, both for military and civilian use.</p><p>The aim of this thesis is to investigate the driver’s experiences of the accelerations he or she is exposed to whilst driving in rough terrain. The results may be used as a basis for future decisions and can act as a platform for the construction of an effective simulation model.</p><p>To investigate the driver’s exposure of acceleration, some kind of dynamic simulation is needed. A terrain track with both small and large obstacles where constructed. A model of a military vehicle and a civil truck where also constructed with consideration given to the original vehicles’ features. The simulation of the ride along the track was then initiated, which resulted in plots for several parameters, such as acceleration and angular acceleration for the driver relative to the track. The work was focused on the vital properties of the vehicle, such as vehicle length, position of mass centre and wheel size.</p><p>The simulations led to some conclusions concerning vehicle properties. Boogie type suspension and lever arm type suspension, vertical distance to mass centre, driver’s position, vehicle length, spring and damper for the cab and number of wheels all turned out to be vital constituents to the driver’s experience. On the other hand, properties such as coefficient of restitution and wheel size turned out to have no significant impact.</p><p>One more conclusion of the work is that CAD software works well for dynamic simulations such as the ones described in this report. It was also apparent that a quite realistic simulation could be achieved with a fairly simple vehicle model. Furthermore, it is essential to get certain parameters such as the vehicle’s length and other major construction differences realistic, otherwise all fine tuning of the vehicle model will be pointless.</p> / <p>Saab Aerosystems har en lång tradition och stor kompetens inom flygsimulering. Strävan efter ett större marknadsområde har gjort att Saab även börjat undersöka möjligheterna att sälja tjänster inom fordonssimulering för både civilt och militärt bruk.</p><p>Examensarbetet syftar till att undersöka en fordonsförares upplevelser av de accelerationer som förekommer under körning i terräng. Resultatet är tänkt att användas som beslutsunderlag och grund för att bygga upp en effektiv simuleringsmodell för bl.a. terränggående fordon.</p><p>För att undersöka accelerationerna som föraren utsätts för krävs någon form av dynamiksimulering. För ändamålet har CAD-programvaran Pro Engineer Wildfire valts. En terrängbana i form av små och stora hinder samt två fordonstyper, ett stridsfordon och en lastbil konstruerades, med verkliga förebilder som utgångspunkt. Simuleringar av fordonets färd längs terrängbanan genomfördes. Varje försök genererade grafer för en mängd olika mätvärden, såsom accelerationer och vinkelaccelerationer för föraren relativt banan. Fokus har legat på att undersöka centrala egenskaper hos fordonet såsom längd, masscentrums läge, däckstorlek m.m. och hur dessa påverkar förarens upplevelse.</p><p>Efter utförda simuleringar stod det klart att de egenskaper hos fordonet som är vitala för förarens upplevelser är boogie- och länkarmsupphängning av hjul, masscentrums läge, förarens position, fordonets axelavstånd, hyttens dämpning och fjädring samt hjulantal. Mindre relevanta för förarens upplevelse är egenskaper såsom stöttal mellan däck och mark samt däckdiameter.</p><p>Av arbetet framgick även att ett CAD-verktyg med dynamikmodul fungerar mycket väl för dynamiksimuleringar av den karaktär som behandlas i examensarbetet. Det går även att konstatera att relativt verklighetsnära fordonsbeteende går att åstadkomma utan speciellt detaljerad modell av fordonet. Det framgick också att det är av stor vikt att se till att övergripande parametrar såsom fordonets längd och principiella konstruktion överensstämmer med verkligheten. Stämmer inte detta blir alla finjusteringar av fordonsmodellen överflödiga.</p>

<p>As more and more people conduct vigilance-based activities at times other than the traditional daytime work hours, the time utilization will continue to escalate in the next century and will further increase the risks of sleepiness-related accidents.</p><p>This project, which is commissioned by Scania CV AB, is to nvestigate the potential of a method for sleepiness detection belonging to esium AB. Our objective is to examine whether Scania CV AB should continue with the investigation of the patent method, and in that case, which patent parameters, that indicate sleepiness, should be more closely inquired. The purpose with the method of patent is to discover a sleepy driving behaviour. This method is based on the interaction that appears between the driver and the vehicle. The interaction consists of small spontaneous corrections with the steering wheel that in this report is called micro communication. How well the interaction is functioning can be measured in degree of interaction, which shows how well the driver and the truck interact with each other. The interaction between the driver and the vehicle is in this report looked upon as answers and questions with a certain reaction time, which appears with a certain answered question frequency. The differences in the signal’s amplitudes are measured in variation in amplitudes.</p><p>Experiments to collect relevant signals have to be conducted in order to investigate the potential with the method of the patent. It is eligible to collect data from a person falling asleep, which implies experiments conducted in a simulator. The experiments are executed in</p><p>a simulator, one test when they are alert and one when they are sleep deprived. Tests are also executed in a Scania truck. The purpose with these experiments is to collect data of the subject’s normal driving pattern in a truck and to investigate if it is possible to obtain</p><p>acceptable data in a truck.</p><p>The sleepiness experiments have indicated that the micro communication takes place in a frequency range of 0.25 to 6.0 Hz. The variables that have been found to detect sleepiness with high reliability are the reaction time and the degree of interaction presented in spectra.</p><p>The validation experiments have shown it is possible to collect exact and accurate data from the lateral acceleration and the steering wheel torque. But, there is more noise in the signals from truck then there is in the signals from the simulator.</p><p>This method for sleepiness detection has, according to the authors, a great potential. However, more experiments have to be conducted. The authors suggest further sleepiness experiments only conducted during night time. The subjects are sufficiently alert in the beginning of the test to receive data from normal driving behaviour. Physiological measurement could be interesting to have by the side of the subjective assessments as an additional base for comparison.</p>

<p>Accurate measurements from sensors measuring the vehicle's lateral behavior are vital in todays vehicle dynamic control systems such as the Electronic Stability Program (ESP). This thesis concerns accurate plausibilisation of two of these sensors, namely the yaw rate sensor and the lateral acceleration sensor. The estimation is based on Kalman filtering and culminates in the use of a 2 degree-of-freedom nonlinear two-track model describing the vehicle lateral dynamics. The unknown and time-varying cornering stiffnesses are adapted while the unknown yaw moment of inertia is estimated. The Kalman filter transforms the measured signals into a sequence of residuals that are then investigated with the aid of various change detection methods such as the CuSum algorithm. An investigation into the area of adaptive thresholding has also been made.</p><p>The change detection methods investigated successfully detects faults in both the yaw rate and the lateral acceleration sensor. It it also shown that adaptive thresholding can be used to improve the diagnosis system. All of the results have been evaluated on-line in a prototype vehicle with real-time fault injection.</p>

<p>This thesis deals with energetic oxygen ions (i.e. single-charged atomic oxygen ions, O+) at altitudes higher than 5 Earth radii (RE) and at latitudes above 75 (toward 90) degrees invariant latitude (deg ILAT) in the dayside polar magnetosphere observed by Cluster. The instrument used in this study is CIS (Cluster Ion Spectrometry experiment) / CODIF (a time-of-flight ion COmposition and DIstribution Function analyser), which covers an energy range from »10 eV up to 38 keV. Cluster detected O+ with energies more than 1 keV (hereafter termed “keV O+”), indicating that energization and/or acceleration process(es) take place in the dayside high-altitude (inside magnetopause) and high-latitude region. These O+ are outflowing (precisely, upward-going along the geomagnetic field lines), and these outflowing keV O+ show a heated (or energized) signature in the velocity distribution as well.</p><p>First, outflowing O+ are observed at the poleward cusp and/or the mantle formed a partial shell-like configuration seen in the velocity distribution. Second, the latitudinal distribution of outflowing O+ (most of them have energies less than 1 keV statistically) observed below 7 RE is consistent with velocity filter effect by the polar convection, while the latitudinal distribution of outflowing keV O+ observed above 7 RE cannot be explained by velocity filter effect only, i.e. this indicates that additional energization and/or acceleration takes place at higher altitudes in the dayside polar region. Thirdly, a tendency to observe outflowing keV O+ for during different geomagnetic conditions is studied. The keV O+ above 9 RE is more often for K p¸5 rather than for K p•3. However the energy of O+ is not dependent on ASY /SYM indices.</p><p>Finally, the dependence on the solar wind conditions is also studied. The energization and/or acceleration of outflowing O+ is controlled by both solar wind moments (except solar wind electric field) and strong southward interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) at the time scale of tens of minutes at only higher altitudes. Further examination shows that solar wind dependence is different at three regions: one is the poleward cusp, another is the low-altitude polar cap, and finally the high-altitude polar cap, combining all the results. There is (a) new energization and/or acceleration process(es) at the high-altitude polar cap. On the other hand, flux enhancement of O+ observed above 5 RE is also controlled by solar wind moments (e.g. solar wind electric field) and strong southward IMF, however the ionospheric changes play a more important role on the flux enhancement of O+.</p>

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2006. / Title from first page of PDF file. Includes bibliographical references (p. 145-162).

Die moderne Kultur- und Sozialgeschichte lässt sich – auf den Ebenen des Transports, der Informationsübertragung und der interpersonellen Kommunikation – als ein sich permanent steigernder Beschleunigungsprozess beschreiben. Insbesondere neuartige Medientechnologien verkürzen die zeitlichen Intervalle der Kommunikation zunehmend. Es ist davon auszugehen, dass sich die dem Geschwindigkeitsimperativ unterliegenden neuen Kommunikationsbedingungen in sprachlichen Innovationen niederschlagen und diese wiederum Indikatoren für Sprachwandel sind. In der jüngsten linguistischen Forschung wird allerdings vielfach die These geäußert, der Sprachgebrauch in den neuen Medien indiziere fundamentale Veränderungen der Schriftlichkeit und führe zu einem sprachlichen Verfall besonderen Ausmaßes. Diese These soll am Beispiel schriftbasierter Alltagskommunikation – vom Telegramm über den Brief und der Internetkommunikation bis hin zur SMS-Kommunikation – in medien-, kultur- und texthistorischen Zusammenhängen überprüft werden. Es geht darum, die kulturhistorischen Modalitäten der Medien- und Beschleunigungsgenese aufzudecken und spezifische mediale und kontextuelle Bedingungen sprachlicher Veränderungen herauszustellen. / It is generally considered that the modern history of culture is widely influenced by a permanent process of increasing acceleration. This social trend occurs on different levels, such as public transport, information transport and interpersonal communication. Particularly, new emerging media technologies are abbreviating the temporal intervals of daily communication increasingly. Starting from this premise, it can be assumed that new conditions of communication based on speed imperatives result in special linguistic innovations. In doing so, these innovations clearly reveal the mechanisms of language change. However, in recent linguistic debates, it is frequently asserted that the use of language in new media applications causes fundamental changes of written language and, moreover, results in a language decay of exceeding extent. By pulling together several strands of empirical evidence and conceptual approaches this thesis is to be examined by the example of written-based everyday life communication, i.e. telegram, letter and Internet communication up to SMS communication - within a medial, cultural and text-historical context. The objective of this paper is to investigate the culture-historical modalities of media and acceleration genesis and to point specific medial and contextual conditions out of language change.

The Sun is a star, which due to its proximity has a tremendous influence on Earth. Since its very first days mankind tried to "understand the Sun", and especially in the 20th century science has uncovered many of the Sun's secrets by using high resolution observations and describing the Sun by means of models. As an active star the Sun's activity, as expressed in its magnetic cycle, is closely related to the sunspot numbers. Flares play a special role, because they release large energies on very short time scales. They are correlated with enhanced electromagnetic emissions all over the spectrum. Furthermore, flares are sources of energetic particles. Hard X-ray observations (e.g., by NASA's RHESSI spacecraft) reveal that a large fraction of the energy released during a flare is transferred into the kinetic energy of electrons. However the mechanism that accelerates a large number of electrons to high energies (beyond 20 keV) within fractions of a second is not understood yet. The thesis at hand presents a model for the generation of energetic electrons during flares that explains the electron acceleration based on real parameters obtained by real ground and space based observations. According to this model photospheric plasma flows build up electric potentials in the active regions in the photosphere. Usually these electric potentials are associated with electric currents closed within the photosphere. However as a result of magnetic reconnection, a magnetic connection between the regions of different magnetic polarity on the photosphere can establish through the corona. Due to the significantly higher electric conductivity in the corona, the photospheric electric power supply can be closed via the corona. Subsequently a high electric current is formed, which leads to the generation of hard X-ray radiation in the dense chromosphere. The previously described idea is modelled and investigated by means of electric circuits. For this the microscopic plasma parameters, the magnetic field geometry and hard X-ray observations are used to obtain parameters for modelling macroscopic electric components, such as electric resistors, which are connected with each other. This model demonstrates that such a coronal electric current is correlated with large scale electric fields, which can accelerate the electrons quickly up to relativistic energies. The results of these calculations are encouraging. The electron fluxes predicted by the model are in agreement with the electron fluxes deduced from the measured photon fluxes. Additionally the model developed in this thesis proposes a new way to understand the observed double footpoint hard X-ray sources. / Die Sonne ist ein Stern, der aufgrund seiner räumlichen Nähe einen großen Einfluss auf die Erde hat. Seit jeher hat die Menschheit versucht die "Sonne zu verstehen" und besonders im 20. Jahrhundert gelang es der Wissenschaft viele der offenen Fragen mittels Beobachtungen zu beantworten und mit Modellen zu beschreiben. Die Sonne ist ein aktiver Stern, dessen Aktivität sich in seinem magnetischen Zyklus ausdrückt, welcher in enger Verbindung zu den Sonnenfleckenzahlen steht. Flares spielen dabei eine besondere Rolle, da sie hohe Energien auf kurzen Zeitskalen freisetzen. Sie werden begleitet von erhöhter Strahlungsemission über das gesamte Spektrum hinweg und setzen darüber hinaus auch energetische Teilchen frei. Beobachtungen von harter Röntgenstrahlung (z.B. mit der RHESSI Raumsonde der NASA) zeigen, dass ein großer Teil der freigesetzten Energie in die kinetische Energie von Elektronen transferiert wird. Allerdings ist nach wie vor nicht verstanden, wie die Beschleunigung der vielen Elektronen auf hohe Energien (jenseits von 20 keV) in Bruchteilen einer Sekunde erfolgt. Die vorliegende Arbeit präsentiert ein Model für die Erzeugung von energetischen Elektronen während solarer Flares, das auf mit realen Beobachtungen gewonnenen Parametern basiert. Danach bauen photosphärische Plasmaströmungen elektrische Spannungen in den aktiven Regionen der Photosphäre auf. Für gewöhnlich sind diese Potentiale mit elektrischen Strömen verbunden, die innerhalb der Photosphäre geschlossen sind. Allerdings kann infolge von magnetischer Rekonnektion eine magnetische Verbindung in der Korona aufgebaut werden, die die Regionen von magnetisch unterschiedlicher Polarität miteinander verbindet. Wegen der deutlich höheren koronalen elektrischen Leitfähigkeit, kann darauf die photosphärische Spannungsquelle über die Korona geschlossen werden. Das auf diese Weise generierte elektrische Feld führt nachfolgend zur Erzeugung eines hohen elektrischen Stromes, der in der dichten Chromosphäre harte Röntgenstrahlung generiert. Die zuvor erläuterte Idee wird mit elektrischen Schaltkreisen modelliert und untersucht. Dafür werden die mikroskopischen Plasmaparameter, die Geometrie des Magnetfeldes und Beobachtungen der harten Röntgenstrahlung verwendet, um makroskopische elektronische Komponenten, wie z.B. elektrische Widerstände zu modellieren und miteinander zu verbinden. Es wird gezeigt, dass der auftretende koronale Strom mit hohen elektrischen Feldern verbunden ist, welche Elektronen schnell auf hohe relativistische Energien beschleunigen können. Die Ergebnisse dieser Berechnungen sind ermutigend. Die vorhergesagten Elektronenflüsse stehen im Einklang mit aus gemessenen Photonenflüssen gewonnenen Elektronenflüssen. Zudem liefert das Model einen neuen Ansatz für das Verständnis der harten Röntgendoppelquellen in den Fußpunkten.

Our dynamic Sun manifests its activity by different phenomena: from the 11-year cyclic sunspot pattern to the unpredictable and violent explosions in the case of solar flares. During flares, a huge amount of the stored magnetic energy is suddenly released and a substantial part of this energy is carried by the energetic electrons, considered to be the source of the nonthermal radio and X-ray radiation. One of the most important and still open question in solar physics is how the electrons are accelerated up to high energies within (the observed in the radio emission) short time scales. Because the acceleration site is extremely small in spatial extent as well (compared to the solar radius), the electron acceleration is regarded as a local process. The search for localized wave structures in the solar corona that are able to accelerate electrons together with the theoretical and numerical description of the conditions and requirements for this process, is the aim of the dissertation. Two models of electron acceleration in the solar corona are proposed in the dissertation: I. Electron acceleration due to the solar jet interaction with the background coronal plasma (the jet--plasma interaction) A jet is formed when the newly reconnected and highly curved magnetic field lines are relaxed by shooting plasma away from the reconnection site. Such jets, as observed in soft X-rays with the Yohkoh satellite, are spatially and temporally associated with beams of nonthermal electrons (in terms of the so-called type III metric radio bursts) propagating through the corona. A model that attempts to give an explanation for such observational facts is developed here. Initially, the interaction of such jets with the background plasma leads to an (ion-acoustic) instability associated with growing of electrostatic fluctuations in time for certain range of the jet initial velocity. During this process, any test electron that happen to feel this electrostatic wave field is drawn to co-move with the wave, gaining energy from it. When the jet speed has a value greater or lower than the one, required by the instability range, such wave excitation cannot be sustained and the process of electron energization (acceleration and/or heating) ceases. Hence, the electrons can propagate further in the corona and be detected as type III radio burst, for example. II. Electron acceleration due to attached whistler waves in the upstream region of coronal shocks (the electron--whistler--shock interaction) Coronal shocks are also able to accelerate electrons, as observed by the so-called type II metric radio bursts (the radio signature of a shock wave in the corona). From in-situ observations in space, e.g., at shocks related to co-rotating interaction regions, it is known that nonthermal electrons are produced preferably at shocks with attached whistler wave packets in their upstream regions. Motivated by these observations and assuming that the physical processes at shocks are the same in the corona as in the interplanetary medium, a new model of electron acceleration at coronal shocks is presented in the dissertation, where the electrons are accelerated by their interaction with such whistlers. The protons inflowing toward the shock are reflected there by nearly conserving their magnetic moment, so that they get a substantial velocity gain in the case of a quasi-perpendicular shock geometry, i.e, the angle between the shock normal and the upstream magnetic field is in the range 50--80 degrees. The so-accelerated protons are able to excite whistler waves in a certain frequency range in the upstream region. When these whistlers (comprising the localized wave structure in this case) are formed, only the incoming electrons are now able to interact resonantly with them. But only a part of these electrons fulfill the the electron--whistler wave resonance condition. Due to such resonant interaction (i.e., of these electrons with the whistlers), the electrons are accelerated in the electric and magnetic wave field within just several whistler periods. While gaining energy from the whistler wave field, the electrons reach the shock front and, subsequently, a major part of them are reflected back into the upstream region, since the shock accompanied with a jump of the magnetic field acts as a magnetic mirror. Co-moving with the whistlers now, the reflected electrons are out of resonance and hence can propagate undisturbed into the far upstream region, where they are detected in terms of type II metric radio bursts. In summary, the kinetic energy of protons is transfered into electrons by the action of localized wave structures in both cases, i.e., at jets outflowing from the magnetic reconnection site and at shock waves in the corona. / Die Sonne ist ein aktiver Stern, was sich nicht nur in den allseits bekannten Sonnenflecken, sondern auch in Flares manifestiert. Während Flares wird eine große Menge gespeicherter, magnetischer Energie in einer kurzen Zeit von einigen Sekunden bis zu wenigen Stunden in der Sonnenkorona freigesetzt. Dabei werden u.a. energiereiche Elektronen erzeugt, die ihrerseits nichtthermische Radio- und Röntgenstrahlung, wie sie z.B. am Observatorium für solare Radioastronomie des Astrophysikalischen Instituts Potsdam (AIP) in Tremsdorf und durch den NASA-Satelliten RHESSI beobachtet werden, erzeugen. Da diese Elektronen einen beträchtlichen Anteil der beim Flare freigesetzten Energie tragen, ist die Frage, wie Elektronen in kurzer Zeit auf hohe Energien in der Sonnenkorona beschleunigt werden, von generellem astrophysikalischen Interesse, da solche Prozesse auch in anderen Sternatmosphären und kosmischen Objekten, wie z.B. Supernova-Überresten, stattfinden. In der vorliegenden Dissertation wird die Elektronenbeschleunigung an lokalen Wellenstrukturen im Plasma der Sonnenkorona untersucht. Solche Wellen treten in der Umgebung der magnetischen Rekonnektion, die als ein wichtiger Auslöser von Flares angesehen wird, und in der Nähe von Stoßwellen, die infolge von Flares erzeugt werden, auf. Generell werden die Elektronen als Testteilchen behandelt. Sie werden durch ihre Wechselwirkung mit den elektrischen und magnetischen Feldern, die mit den Plasmawellen verbunden sind, beschleunigt. Infolge der magnetischen Rekonnektion als Grundlage des Flares werden starke Plasmaströmungen (sogenannte Jets) erzeugt. Solche Jets werden im Licht der weichen Röntgenstrahlung, wie z.B. durch den japanischen Satelliten YOHKOH, beobachtet. Mit solchen Jets sind solare Typ III Radiobursts als Signaturen von energiereichen Elektronenstrahlen in der Sonnenkorona verbunden. Durch die Wechselwirkung eines Jets mit dem umgebenden Plasma werden lokal elektrische Felder erzeugt, die ihrerseits Elektronen beschleunigen können. Dieses hier vorgestellte Szenarium kann sehr gut die Röntgen- und Radiobeobachtungen von Jets und den damit verbundenen Elektronenstrahlen erklären. An koronalen Stoßwellen, die infolge Flares entstehen, werden Elektronen beschleunigt, deren Signatur man in der solaren Radiostrahlung in Form von sogenannten Typ II Bursts beobachten kann. Stoßwellen in kosmischen Plasmen können mit Whistlerwellen (ein spezieller Typ von Plasmawellen) verbunden sein. In der vorliegenden Arbeit wird ein Szenarium vorgestellt, das aufzeigt, wie solche Whistlerwellen an koronalen Stoßwellen erzeugt werden und durch ihre resonante Wechselwirkung mit den Elektronen dieselben beschleunigen. Dieser Prozess ist effizienter als bisher vorgeschlagene Mechanismen und kann deshalb auch auf andere Stoßwellen im Kosmos, wie z.B. an Supernova-Überresten, zur Erklärung der dort erzeugten Radio- und Röntgenstrahlung dienen.

The human foot contributes significantly to the function of the whole lower extremity during standing and locomotion. Nevertheless, the foot and ankle often suffer injuries and are affected by many musculoskeletal and neurological pathologies. The overall aim of this thesis was to evaluate gait parameters and muscle function change due to foot and ankle injury, malalignment and co-contraction. Using 3D gait analysis, analytical analyses and computational simulations, biomechanical consequences of gait impairment at the ankle and foot were explored in ablebodied persons and in patient groups with disorders affecting walking. We have characterized gait patterns of subjects with ankle fractures with a modified multi-segment foot model. The inter-segmental foot kinematics were determined during gait in 18 subjects one year after surgically-treated ankle fractures. Gait data were compared to an age- and gender-matched control group and the correlations between functional ankle score and gait parameters were determined. It was observed that even with fairly good clinical results, restricted range of motion and malalignment at and around the injured area were found in the injured limb. Moment-angle relationship (dynamic joint stiffness) - the relationship between changes in joint moment and changes in joint angle - is useful for demonstrating interaction of kinematics and kinetics during gait. Ankle dynamic joint stiffness during the stance phase of gait was analyzed and decomposed into three components in thirty able-bodied children, eight children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis and eight children with idiopathic toe-walking. Compared to controls, the component associated with changes of ground reaction moment was the source of highest deviation in both pathological groups. Specifically, ankle dynamic joint stiffness differences can be further identified via two subcomponents of this component which are based on magnitudes and rates of change of the ground reaction force and of its moment arm. And differences between the two patient groups and controls were most evident and interpretable here. Computational simulations using 3D musculoskeltal models can be powerful in investigating movement mechanisms, which are not otherwise possible or ethical to measure experimentally. We have quantified the effect of subtalar malalignment on the potential dynamic function of the main ankle dorsiflexors and plantarflexors: the gastrocnemius, soleus and tibialis anterior. Induced acceleration analysis was used to compute muscle-induced joint angular and body center of mass accelerations. A three-dimensional subject-specific linkage model was configured by gait data and driven by 1 Newton of individual muscle force. The excessive subtalar inversion or eversion was modified by offsetting up to ±20˚ from the normal subtalar angle while other configurations remain unaltered. We confirmed that in normal gait, muscles generally acted as their anatomical definitions, and that muscles can create motion in many joints, even those not spanned by the muscles. Excessive subtalar eversion was found to enlarge the plantarflexors’ and tibialis anterior’s function. In order to ascertain the reliability of muscle function computed from simulations, we have also performed a parametric study on eight healthy adults to evaluate how sensitive the muscle-induced joints’ accelerations are to the parameters of rigid foot-ground contact model. We quantified accelerations induced by the gastrocnemius, soleus and tibialis anterior on the lower limb joints. Two types of models, a ‘fixed joint’ model with three fixed joints under the foot and a ‘moving joint’ model with one joint located along the moving center of pressure were evaluated. The influences of different foot-ground contact joint constraints and locations of center of pressure were also investigated. Our findings indicate that both joint locations and prescribed degrees-of-freedom of models affect the predicted potential muscle function, wherein the joint locations are most influential. The pronounced influences can be observed in the non-sagittal plane. Excessive muscle co-contraction is a cause of inefficient or abnormal movement in some neuromuscular pathologies. We have identified the necessary compensation strategies to overcome excessive antagonistic muscle cocontraction at the ankle joint and retain a normal walking pattern. Muscle-actuated simulation of normal walking and induced acceleration analysis were performed to quantify compensatory mechanisms of the primary ankle and knee muscles in the presence of normal, medium and high levels of co-contraction of two antagonistic pairs (gastrocnemiustibialis anterior and soleus-tibialis anterior). The study showed that if the co-contraction level increases, the nearby synergistic muscles can contribute most to compensation in the gastrocnemius-tibialis anterior pair. In contrast, with the soleus-tibialis anterior co-contraction, the sartorius and hamstrings can provide important compensatory roles in knee accelerations. This dissertation documented a broad range of gait mechanisms and muscle functions in the foot and ankle area employing both experiments and computational simulations. The strategies and mechanisms in which altered gait and muscles activation are used to compensate for impairment can be regarded as references for evaluation of future patients and for dynamic muscle functions during gait. / QC 20120514