Bio-mechanical simulator for realistic medical avatars

From medicine to realistic animation

Developed by the National Center for Simulation in Rehabilitation Research at Stanford University, OpenSim is a free, scalable software program that enables the development of models of musculoskeletal structures and the creation of dynamic movement simulations.

In other words, the humanoid virtual avatars generated by this software look real despite all their anatomical differences: a stocky person doesn't move like a more slender one, a person who walks with a prosthesis doesn't move like one who is anatomically symmetrical, and so on.

There are 640 different muscle bundles in the human body. OpenSim makes it possible to determine their role and characteristics in an in a precise and realistic way. To create an avatar, we will take the measurements of a subject and data on his morphology, the orientation of his joints and the muscle force he is capable of generating. From these data the software calculates how he can or could perform a particular movement.

The software is relatively easy to use to model, simulate, control and analyze the neuromusculoskeletal system. Some simulations have also been developed for animals.

What is the benefit?

In rehabilitative medicine, every patient is different and this software allows you to simulate their characteristics in detail and the treatments that will be most effective.
In robotics, developers determine the best configurations to achieve robots that move fluidly and efficiently and can tolerate load shifts without losing their balance.
In sports, trainers can determine the contribution of each muscle group in developing the performance of athletic movements.
For education and training in anatomy. Trainers can compare the effects of different morphologies and the roles of different muscle groups and their interactions with the balance of the whole.
In animation, programmers can get characters that move realistically according to their morphological characteristics. An obese giant of 200 Kg does not move in the same way as a child.

And surely other applications will be developed.

This short video presents the potential of this software.