Simulation of Skeletal Muscles in Real-Time with Parallel Computing in GPU

Abstract

Modeling and simulation of the skeletal muscles are usually solved using the Finite Element method (FEM) which, although accurate, commonly needs a complex mesh and the solution is not processed in real-time. In this work, a meshfree model that simulates skeletal muscles considering their functioning and control based on electrical activity, their structure based on biological tissue, and that computes in real-time, is presented. Meshfree methods were used because they are able to surpass most of the limitations that are present in mesh-based methods. The muscular belly was modelled as a particle-based viscoelastic fluid, which is controlled using the monodomain model and shape matching. The smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH) method was used to solve both the fluid dynamics and the electrophysiological model. To analyze the accuracy of the method, a similar model was implemented with FEM. Both FEM and SPH methods provide similar solutions of the models in terms of pressure and displacement, with an error of around 0.09, with up to a 10% difference between them. Through the use of General-purpose computing on graphics processing units (GPGPU), real-time simulations that offer a viable alternative to mesh-based models for interactive biological tissue simulations was achieved.

Spark distributed system and GPU parallel computing

“…The time required for the end of each algorithm and the number of iterations are similar, and the optimization results will change. The reason is that the simulated tit-for-tat algorithm is a random optimization algorithm, and with the increase of annealing time, the possibility of jumping out of the local optimal solution gradually decreases [8]. In order to increase the probability of jumping out of the local solution and ensure that the simulated annealing does find the best solution, the simulated annealing experiment continues periodically.…”

Elastic Simulation of Joints with Particle-Based Fluid

“…The kernel is mainly used by poly6 [37] and as a visibility kernel or a spiky kernel [39]. Navarro et al used a particle-based viscoelastic fluid to express the skeletal muscle moving due to electrical activity [40]. Ruffini et al proposed a model that combines DualSPHysics and CHRONO to measure the impact of dams when flooding occurs [41].…”

Development of a novel real-time simulation of human skeleton/muscles

“…One of the major purposes of real-time simulation is detecting and solving problems of industrial machines, vehicles, or robots reliably and safely by using a simulation model instead of a real system prototype. Nowadays, realtime simulation is also applied in biomechanics to simulate the human body in order to recognize supporting forces and torques acting on muscles and joints, respectively (Navarro-Hinojosa and Alencastre-Miranda, 2020;van den Bogert et al, 2013). The creation of a real-time simulation model of the human body provides tremendous opportunities for various biomechanics researches and can widely be used in the physiotherapeutic rehabilitation process.…”