Abstract

Theoretically speaking, the modelling process is based on developing a model representing all properties of an object or phenomenon corresponding to the purpose of the analysis. To this effect, carrying out a virtual model of the human body consists of representing its main characteristics, as close to reality as possible. Motive activities of the human upper limb result from the motion of kinematical chains made by skeletal elements connected by joints. The aim of this paper is to describe the human upper limb as a kinematical structure similar to that of a robot with five degrees of freedom for which we apply the conventions of Robotics, obtaining the kinematical model of the human upper limb. In this case, the arm has three degrees of freedom in the shoulder joint, the forearm one degree of freedom in the elbow joint and the hand one degree of freedom in the radiocarpal joint. The kinematical equations of motion obtained are parametric and express the position and orientation of the hand in relation to a fixed reference frame. One of the most important applications of parametric representation of the systems is the working space modelling described by the end of the kinematical chain during the motion. The approach to hyper-surfaces modelling is based on the direct geometric model considering the human upper limb as a kinematical structure similar to that of a robot. For generating the surfaces in which the end-effector of the human upper limb moves, we applied certain specific functions of the Matlab program.