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U.L.E.M.A. Upper Limb Evaluation in Motion Analysis

U.L.E.M.A. is a MATLAB-based GUI tool for quickly processing three-dimensional upper limb movements that have been recorded using Motion Capture devices (C3D files).

With U.L.E.M.A. you can:

• Perform anatomical landmarks reconstruction and process joint kinematics by using the embedded engine BodyMech;
• Segment the motion file data into motion cycles by a certain custom-made events schema;
• Calculate spatio-temporal parameters for cycles;
• Rank each cycles by using the RMSE technique (see articles below);
• Calculate clinically-relevant parameters such as Arm Value Score (AVS) and Arm Profile Score (APS);
• Add calibrated anatomical landmarks, kinematics and spatio-temporal parameters data back to the original C3D for Polygon reports;
• Export data in different formats (MAT, CSV, PDF, XML);
• Create reference data MAT files from processed data;
• Save processed data MAT files for further late (re)processing;
• Create / edit / delete different sets of processing options (procotols);

It is bundled with the "Report Generator", a stand-alone Python-based and plugin-enabled GUI application for transforming custom-made templates into (editable) reports.

The software was developed by the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium) through a collaboration between the following groups:

• CMAL-P (Clinical Movement Analysis Laboratory, UZ Pellenberg)
• PMA (Division of Production engineering, Machine design and Automation)
• FaBeR (Faculty of Kinesiology and Rehabilitation Sciences)

The most recent version of U.L.E.M.A. is 1.2.1.

The most recent version of Report Generator is 1.1.

Requirements for U.L.E.M.A.:

• Windows XP / 7 / 10 (Linux / MacOSX are not yet supported)
• MATLAB (U.L.E.M.A. developed with R2010a and tested with R2010a or newer)
• Signal Processing Toolbox for MATLAB

Requirements for Report Generator:

• Windows XP / Vista / 7 / 10

Documentation:

Both U.L.E.M.A and Report Generator are documented with manuals and additional useful information. These documents can be found inside the folder Doc of each application.

Please cite the following articles when using the software; these articles provide a further description of the processing protocol:

1. Jaspers, E., Feys, H., Bruyninckx, H., Cutti, A.G., Harlaar, J., Molenaers, G., Desloovere, K. The reliability of upper limb kinematics in children with hemiplegic cerebral palsy. Gait Posture 2011; 33(4): 568-575 (citations : 6) (IF most recent : 1.969).

2. Jaspers, E., Feys, H., Bruyninckx, H., Klingels, K., Molenaers, G., Desloovere, K. The Arm Profile Score: A new summary index to assess upper limb movement pathology. Gait Posture 2011; 34(2): 227-233 (citations : 3) (IF most recent : 1.969).

Other relevant articles:

1. Jaspers, E., Feys, H., Bruyninckx, H., Harlaar, J., Molenaers, G., Desloovere, K. Upper limb kinematics: Development and reliability of a clinical protocol for children. Gait Posture 2011; 33(2): 279-285 (citations : 8) (IF most recent : 1.969).

2. Jaspers, E., Desloovere, K., Bruyninckx, H., Klingels, K., Molenaers, G., Aertbeliën, E., Van Gestel, L., Feys, H. Three-dimensional upper limb movement characteristics in children with hemiplegic cerebral palsy and typically developing children. Res Dev Disabil 2011; 32(6): 2283-2294 (citations : 3) (IF most recent : 2.483).

3. Jaspers, E., Feys, H., Bruyninckx, H., Molenaers, G., Klingels, K., Desloovere, K. Review of quantitative measurements of upper limb movements in hemiplegic cerebral palsy. Gait Posture 2009; 30(4): 395-404 (citations : 17) (IF most recent : 1.969).

This application builds upon following tools (already embedded in the application):

1. BodyMech
2. bt-k
3. XML Toolbox for MATLAB
4. Useful functions provided by Prof. Dr. Alberto Leardini (IOR) and Dr. Andrea G. Cutti (INAIL)

We would like acknowledge the authors of these tools here!

For any bug / issue / improvement:

• please log-in into GitHub, or create your new account
• create a new issue by clicking on Issues --> New Issue
• avoid any direct mail to the contributors, so that all the knowledge can be shared

What's new

U.L.E.M.A.:

1.2.1 (20/02/2020):

• Solved issue #33 (Kinematics sub-GUI too high in Windows 10)

1.2.0 (06/03/2018):

• Switched to semantic versioning
• Solved issue #32 (MATLAB 2018 sub-GUIs issues)

1.1.9 (20/10/2016):

• Updated with issue #28 (wrong offset added to absolute angles when chair position in a task is different from static refence position file)
• Updated with issue #29 (reading C3D files where markers are repeated inside)

1.1.8 (22/06/2016):

• Solved issue #27 (error in new MATLAB 2015b)

1.1.7 (18/05/2016):

• Update trial segmentation configuration file with a new splitting pattern with 4 phases
• Created new protocol that uses the segmentation indicated above

1.1.6 (29/01/2016):

• Solved issue #24 (erroneous zone for marker data interpolation and gimbal lock correction)
• Anatomical marker data calculated from clusters with missing technical markers is not shown (wrong) anymore in the exported C3D.
• Solved issue #25 (one NaN contained in cycle-striped data when there is not data already in the frame before the first event for the first cycle)
• Enhanced with issue #26 (C3D not starting from frame 1 are now usable)

1.1.5 (03/06/2015):

• Solved issue #23 (bug when adding data to C3D if the file does not contain the SUBJECTS section).

1.1.4 (03/12/2014):

• Solved issue #22 (wrong data structure creation in Prot/ProtDB.mat when editing angles lists for best cycles selection).

1.1.3 (24/11/2014):

• Solved issue #20 (Issue in marker deleting when filtering for unwanted joints)
• Camera rate is now read from the parameter RATE in the group POINT (wheras before it was read from TRIAL/CAMERA_RATE). This seems like a more standard way to get this value (it works for Qualysis and Vicon).
• Improved documentation now including mandatory data for C3D files.

1.1.2 (05/02/2014):

• Solved issue #12 (added BTK bindings for Windows 7 32-bit)

1.1.1 (31/01/2014):

• Solved issue #11 (Geometrical GH estimation)
• Fixed bug happening during exportation to C3D and when no marker related spatio-temporal parameters were calculated

1.1.0 (13/01/2014):

• Possibility to read a single calibration file where markers are placed directly on anatomical landmarks
• Improved gimbal lock correction for angles
• Possibility to perform functional axis calibration
• Possibility to export (to C3D) virtual indicator markers for visual quality check of functional axis reconstruction
• Possibility to express a custom lab reference frame (for absolute angles) with respect to the real lab reference frame
• Upgraded nutshell manual
• Upgraded extended manual
• Minor bugs fixed
• A few BodyMech functions adjusted to be working in MATLAB R2013

1.0.6 (25/11/2013):

• Added developers guide

1.0.6 (14/06/2013):

• Raw data reading, previously part of the kinematics process, is now provided in a separate section.
• Documentation updated

1.0.5 (03/05/2013):

• When exporting to C3D, the region of non-forced-to-0 angles is expanded with 1 frame, to avoid bad visualization in Polygon
• MAPs bar graphs have colors for a better indentifaction of overlapping IQR
• MAPs title is split in 2 rows, to avoid clipping when too long

1.0.4 (22/05/2013):

• For the angle curves, data is forced to 0 before the first event and after the last event, for every file, before exporting to C3D. This way, the angle data between the first and last event is of good quality, since we agreed to have good marker data in that interval (check in Nexus). Without bad marker data, Polygon will never parse for bad data into the C3Ds and will always plot curves data.

1.0.3 (30/04/2013):

• Added automatic gimbal-lock correction for joint angles
• timeVmax is in % of the phase duration and not in seconds anymore
• protocols Left, Right, Right_Pellenberg, Left_Pellenberg, Right_NoGH_Pellenberg, Left_NoGH_Pellenberg edited to follow planned protocol at UZ Pellenberg

1.0.2 (04/03/2013):

• Corrected measurement unit for trajectory index when exporting to C3D
• Technical marker data is not written back anymore to C3D (for safety reasons)
• "Proc. data saving" is added under Options -> Processing
• Documentation updated with section 6.6
• In ProtDB.mat 2 new protocols added that are used in CMAL-P (Leuven, Belgium)

1.0.1 (11/10/2012):

• First draft of documentation created
• Minor user-interface labels changed
• For a selected segmentation method, a small description is shown

1.0 (05/10/2012):

• Official name for the software is decided: U.L.E.M.A.: Upper Limb Evaluation in Motion Analysis

1.0 (24/09/2012):

• First release

Report generator:

1.1 (05/10/2012):

• Added "Descriptors Editor" tool under main window -> "Tools" -> "Descriptors Editor..."
• The software is now plugin based (where UL is the only puglin available now); this makes the software ideally customizable for every other purpose

1.0 (24/09/2012):

• First release