Technologies for decomposing the electromyographic (EMG) signal into its constituent motor unit action potential trains have become more practical by the advent of a non-invasive methodology using surface EMG (sEMG) sensors placed on the skin above the muscle of interest (De Luca et al 2006 J. Neurophysiol. 96 1646-57 and Nawab et al 2010 Clin. Neurophysiol. 121 1602-15). This advancement has w...

The Brushless DC (BLDC) motor is a simple robust machine which has found application over a wide power and speed of ranges in different shapes and geometry. This paper briefly reviews the fundamentals behind the motor and also the different types of BLDC motors with different geometries and then presents a new configuration for BLDC motor/generator, which does not use a permanent magnet in the ...

Limitations associated with global measures of function in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and the qualitative nature of needle electromyography have stimulated the development of alternate means of monitoring disease severity and progression in ALS. Thus, the objective of this study was to examine the ability of one these techniques, decomposition-based quantitative electromy...

OBJECTIVE To establish the inter-rater reliability of decomposition-based quantitative electromyography (DQEMG) derived motor unit number estimates (MUNEs) and quantitative motor unit (MU) analysis. METHODS Using DQEMG, two examiners independently obtained a sample of needle and surface-detected motor unit potentials (MUPs) from the tibialis anterior muscle from 10 subjects. Coupled with a ma...

Background: The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of bedding preterm infants in nests on their motor behaviors in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) in Iran.Methods: In this randomized controlled trial, 44 clinically stable preterm infants, admitted to the NICU, were recruited and randomly divided into two groups of control and intervention. The routine of the unit was to...

OBJECTIVE To determine the pattern of motor neurone loss in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). In particular, to determine whether there is a gradual life long presymptomatic motor neurone loss or, alternatively, a sudden catastrophic loss just before the onset of symptoms. METHOD The statistical motor unit number estimation (MUNE) technique was used in a longitudinal study of 19 asymptomat...