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The Effect of Quadriceps Fatigue of Repeated Isometric Contractions on Knee Passive Stiffness

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Abstract

Purpose

Fatigue has a potential effect on knee stiffness reduction. Quadriceps fatigue intervention of repeated contractions is one traditional type of inducing knee fatigue. Therefore, defining the connection between quadriceps fatigue and knee stiffness may be beneficial to early knee rehabilitation. Knee passive stiffness was passive component of overall knee stiffness, this study aimed to investigate the effect of quadriceps fatigue on knee passive stiffness.

Methods

The preliminary experiment was first performed with a separate cohort of 6 participants to verify the passive stiffness measurements. Then 30 participants were recruited in fatigue experiment of lower hip angle conditions. The fatigue protocol was induced by repetitive quadriceps isometric contractions in three fatigue cycles. Knee passive stiffness between pre and post 50% range of motion (ROM) groups were calculated by the regression slope of angular displacement-torque curve.

Results

Knee passive stiffness measurements were lower under conditions of lower hip angle. There was a significant difference in passive stiffness between pre and post 50% ROM groups. Only passive stiffness of pre 50% ROM showed a remarkable decrease after fatigue (approximately 3.8%, p < 0.05).

Conclusion

When quadriceps reached fatigue with the repeated isometric contractions, the influence of fatigue on knee passive stiffness of pre and post 50% ROM was different. Passive stiffness of pre 50% ROM decreased significantly when the fatigue threshold reached 90-fold isometric contractions. The finding may help understand how passive knee stiffness changes under fatigue conditions. It may also provide references of fatigue dosage in rehabilitation training to improve knee passive stiffness and ROM in early rehabilitation.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Dr. Zhongqi Liu (Beihang University), Dr. Fan Yang (Li Ning Co. Ltd.), and Chunhui Wen (Jilin Institute of Sports Science),for their assistance in isokinetic dynamometer equipment calibration and technical support. We would like to thank Editage (www.editage.com) for English language editing.

Funding

This study was supported by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC. 12272033, U20A20390), Beijing Science and technology Foundation (Z211100004121005), Space Medical Experiment Project of China Manned Space Program (HYZHXM01003), Young Elite Scientist Sponsorship Program by CAST (YESS 2015QNRC001), and National Key Lab of Virtual Reality Technology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Biomechanics and Mechanobiology (Beihang University), Ministry of Education, Beijing Advanced Innovation Center for Biomedical Engineering, School of Biological Science and Medical Engineering, Beihang University, 37 Xueyuan Road, Haidian District, Beijing, 100083, China

    Xiangfei Kong, Zizhan Lian, Zifan Liu, Jie Yao & Yubo Fan

  2. College of Health Tech, Jilin Sport University, Changchun, 130022, Jilin, China

    Hongdan Wang

  3. School of Medical Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing, China

    Yubo Fan

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  1. Xiangfei Kong
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Contributions

XK: conceptualization, methodology, validation, software, investigation, formal analysis, writing—original draft, writing—review and editing, visualization; HW: conceptualization, methodology, validation, writing—review and editing; ZL: validation, investigation; ZL: software, investigation; JY: validation, formal analysis, supervision, writing—review and editing, project administration, funding acquisition; YF: validation, project administration, funding acquisition. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Jie Yao or Yubo Fan.

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Competing Interests

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

The studies involving human participants were approved by Beihang University Ethics Committee (BM20220082). The participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.

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Kong, X., Wang, H., Lian, Z. et al. The Effect of Quadriceps Fatigue of Repeated Isometric Contractions on Knee Passive Stiffness. J. Med. Biol. Eng. 43, 541–549 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40846-023-00812-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40846-023-00812-0

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