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<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:13.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black"><img width="600" height="171" style="width:6.25in;height:1.7812in" id="그림_x0020_2" src="cid:image001.jpg@01D96E16.16778DD0" alt="Dissertation Defense Announcement at the Cullen College of Engineering"></span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:18.0pt;color:#C8102E">Intermuscular Coordination in Stroke: Its Characterization, Assessment, and Intervention</span></b><o:p></o:p></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:13.5pt;color:black">Gang Seo</span></b><o:p></o:p></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">April 19, 2023; 4:30 PM - 6:30 PM (CST)<br>
Zoom: <a href="https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://uh-edu-cougarnet.zoom.us/j/99011276371?pwd=RDBYa2kvOVp5M0Q1Y1ZuazJZdGhIdz09__;!!LkSTlj0I!EPllBmrd2B5BL1qUWgXm73ISVIA5EpElcdMA9QSpHLReYE-ZpQ_xTTshkHOfe8_0SqQKPTi-Sp8ol_kREtpFUQXseOY$">
https://uh-edu-cougarnet.zoom.us/j/99011276371?pwd=RDBYa2kvOVp5M0Q1Y1ZuazJZdGhIdz09</a></span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">Committee Chair:</span></b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black"><br>
Jinsook Roh, Ph.D.</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">Committee Members:</span></b><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black"><br>
Joseph Thachil Francis, Ph.D | Sheng Li, MD, Ph.D. | Pranav Parikh, Ph.D. | Hyung-Soon Park, Ph.D. | Yingchun Zhang, Ph.D.</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<b><span style="font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:#C8102E">Abstract</span></b><o:p></o:p></p>
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">The question of how the central nervous system (CNS) coordinates the activities of muscles to achieve goal-directed limb movement is fundamental to understanding neuromuscular control.
Recent evidence suggests that the CNS simplifies the control of many degrees of freedom embedded within the redundant musculoskeletal system through facilitating modular organization of multi-muscle activities. The concept of “muscle synergy” has been utilized
to computationally identify this modular organization by applying the dimensionality reduction methods on electromyographic (EMG) signals. Through muscle synergy analysis, the intermuscular coordination patterns underlying human motor behavior, development
and learning have been characterized. Moreover, muscle synergy has been further applied in the field of stroke rehabilitation to assess and target the aberrant intermuscular coordination in the stroke-affected limb.
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<span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial",sans-serif;color:black">This dissertation mainly covers three studies of upper extremity (UE) muscle synergy in stroke: 1) characterization of the relationship between stroke-induced intermuscular coordination
and force control of stroke-affected limb, 2) assessment of the effect of a myoelectric signal-guided rehabilitation protocol in the intermuscular coordination after stroke, and 3) development of a novel stroke rehabilitation protocol targeting stroke-affected
intermuscular coordination. The first study characterized the abnormalities in muscle synergy and end-point force coupling in stroke-affected UE during three-dimensional isometric reaching. This study showed the evidence of contribution of the altered muscle
synergies to the abnormal force control. The second study showed how muscle synergy could be used to assess the minute changes in intermuscular coordination patterns of stroke survivors who participated in six weeks of an EMG-computer interface training. The
third study introduced a novel six-week EMG-guided isometric exercise that could induce the expansion of the repertoire of UE muscle synergy in an intended way in both neurologically intact individuals and stroke survivors. The major finding suggests that
the proposed isometric exercise protocol has the potential to improve the arm motor performance of stroke survivors in their activities of daily living and, ultimately, their quality of life through expanding their repertoire of intermuscular coordination
patterns.</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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