Sports engineers at Victoria University (VU) are leading the way in remote sensor technology, which has many potential applications, ranging from professional sport to healthcare.
Dr Daniel Lai and his team of researchers from VU’s College of Engineering and Science custom-built wireless sensors to attach to the gloves, boots, helmets and bodies of professional track motorcyclists returning from injury to measure the angular velocities and forces applied to various parts of their bodies.
The data was then matched with footage of the superbike riders captured on high-speed cameras to get a complete picture of their body postures and biomechanics.
“Our main aim was to study the forces exerted on the body at high speed around the track,” says Dr Lai. “That tells us the strength required by a rider in various parts of their body to safely negotiate corners.”
“This project has given us a lot of insight into where sensor technology can be used. Considering the vast array of potential applications for this technology, this is a significant achievement in itself.”
His team has plans to investigate the technology’s application in other sports as well as healthcare applications for the general community.
Dr Lai says human-based portable monitoring systems could mean that information on performance, injury recovery and organ function will soon be continuously measured during competitions, daily activity and even during sleep, with data sent back to coaches or medical experts.
“Because the data from continuous monitoring gives us much more information than intermittent monitoring, it has huge benefits and promises to be a major area of technology growth in health care.”
He says having support from industry partners, RACESAFE Australia and Motorcycling Victoria was crucial in the development of the technology.
Victoria University is renowned for its practical applications in sport research, including sport engineering, and partners with elite athletes and sports teams through to the grassroots level. Its research program is supported by a $68 million Sport and Learning Precinct at its Footscray Park Campus, which houses some of the best multi-purpose research and teaching facilities in the Southern Hemisphere.
In 2012, a team of the University’s engineering and biomechanics researchers developed the unique Torxtar, a small 72-gram computer that helped shave time from the performances of Australia’s elite track cyclists at the London Olympics by recording and analysing the biomechanics of their pedalling during training.
Victoria University