Upper Limb Muscle Fatigue Analysis Using Multi-channel Surface EMG

Muscle fatigue is a biochemical process that causes several effects, one of them is changes in muscular electrical activity. Electromyography (EMG) signals detect these changes in the form of frequency shift and amplitude variation. In this study, forearm muscle fatigue has been investigated using 8-channel EMG signal recorded from 15 healthy subjects during isometric contraction. We utilise Median Frequency (MDF) and Root-Mean-Square (RMS) to quantify the fatigue effects on frequency and amplitude, respectively. The changes of both (∆MDF ) and (∆RMS) are the parameters to assess fatigue across subjects and channels. Statistical analysis has been carried out on the results to evaluate the vulnerability of subjects and channels to fatigue. Our methods were able to identify and assess the most and least susceptible subjects and channels to fatigue.