Patent Grant
11154244
The present invention relates to a mobile apparatus and associated system that is completely or partially automated and is configured to measure sport surface (e.g., sport turf) characteristics and the safety of athletic apparel accurately and consistently in an apparel-to-surface interaction, in a manner that is quantifiable and repeatable. This application uses sport turf as an example but is not limited to sport turf, because the invention can be used with non-grass and non-turf surfaces using an appropriate foot form, instrumentation, and/or loads and motions particular to a certain sport (e.g., tennis, baseball, football, soccer, and so on). In examples only, sport turf is considered to be a naturally or artificially grassed surface and the immediate underlying environment, managed and prepared for fast and aggressive playing such as in American Football and Soccer. With reliable gameday, practice, or other data, causes and dangers of injury on natural or synthetic turf, using particular athletic apparel that interact with the turf can be better understood, predicted, and reduced through better field and apparel characterization and rating(s). Moreover, as described herein, the shoe/surface interaction contributes to athletic performance, which, according to the present invention, could also be better characterized, understood, predicted, and even enhanced.
Accurately and consistently quantifying turf conditions, as well as the effect of turf conditions on athletic apparel in situations and conditions that mimic athletic movement, can be used to reduce athletic injury occurrences, improve player performance, establish accurate, independent standards for artificial turf manufacturing, installation, and maintenance, prevent expensive stadium rework, and can lead to standardizing field and turf assessments across sports fields, including but not limited to American football and soccer, just to name a couple examples. With the instrumentation, system, products and methods described herein, and a sport-specific foot form, these tests could be performed on clay surfaces (e.g., baseball skins, warning track, tennis courts), hard surfaces (e.g., tennis, pickleball, volleyball, basketball), sand surfaces (e.g., beach volleyball, bocce, horse tracks), and other grassed (artificial or natural) surfaces such as horse tracks and cricket fields/pitches. With the present invention's instrumentation, the apparatus and system could also be used to quantify performance of a golf club or surface by characterizing a club to ground interaction, including an interaction that results in a portion of the playing surface being removed by the club head. Such testing may also be used in non-athletic environments where synthetic or natural surfaces are utilized. In order to accomplish adequate testing for quantifying turf conditions and effects of athletic apparel, the apparatus taught herein uses not only horizontal and vertical forces, but also torsional forces, and all three forces in combination at the same or different times. Thus, the apparatus and system can apply horizontal, vertical, and torsional forces, and link these forces together and combine them into a single motion to more closely mimic behavior of, for example, a human foot, leg, or entire body during an athletic movement, thereby applying and measuring interactions between all three forces at the same or different times.
In the National Football League (“NFL”), for example only, there is a significantly higher rate of non-contact injuries to lower limbs on synthetic turf than on natural turf (i.e., 28-69% higher). There have been ongoing attempts to determine why this is, however, the results are inconclusive. This suggests that the data currently being collected can be improved upon. Currently, typically before every game, the turf is manually inspected, and the data is recorded for reference if an injury were to occur.
While current on-field tests include impact hardness, infill depth and evenness, soil moisture content, surface shear resistance using a shear vane, percentage ground cover, visual inspection, and stability rating (post-game), the current tests have proven to be inconsistent, non-comprehensive, and subjective. Injuries continue to be a problem in all sports despite currently available safeguards, and a need exists for an improved way to attempt to decrease athletic injuries across all sports, especially those played on turf.
Due to the current limitations, it is an object of the current invention to allow for data collection on, for example, shoe-to-turf interaction while subject to applied forces in order to properly correlate injury to turf characteristics, and/or characteristics of the cleat or shoe. In aspects, data collection might include, for example, kinetic and kinematic data during the shoe-turf interaction, measurement of turf characteristics through additional measuring devices, and recording of characteristics of the shoe and/or turf used for the shoe-turf interaction test. Because of the capabilities of the current invention, when injuries occur, the incidence of injury can be traced back to the turf data or apparel data collected by the inventive apparatus and compared amongst other cases of injury or, alternatively, with cases of non-injury. Once common injury metrics or injury risks are established, by way of example only, mechanical parameters measured can be minimized in the manufacture of turf or athletic apparel, thereby reducing injuries based on quantifiable data. To accomplish this, the current invention is, in aspects, mobile and completely- or partially-automated, and configured to provide reliable data that is repeatable and reproducible.
It is an object of the current invention to test the safety of artificial or natural turf and/or athletic apparel, especially shoes including but not limited to cleats, using a shoe-surface tester that determines and analyzes the mechanical interactions between shoes and an athletic playing surface/turf and performs other measurements commonly taken on turf, and/or determines and analyzes whether the shoes and/or playing surface are up to standards and/or deemed safe for athletic events. The device simulates and measures shoe-to-turf interactions at loads and rates created or generated by athletes during performance up to and including those deemed to be injurious. This involves measuring displacement, velocity, and acceleration components of the shoe and/or foot form in all directions, as well as in rotation, and any combination of these forces at the same or different times. The apparatus may apply or measure all components (dx, dy, dz, rx, ry, rz) of six degrees of freedom forces and moments of the shoe and or foot form.
The apparatus may use a foot form connected to a system of nested frames or a Stewart platform to accomplish this. Thus, the cleat is actuated through its prescribed load or positional path by a mechanism capable of imparting and withstanding the significant forces and moments without unwanted mechanical deformation, friction, or fatigue that might otherwise influence the data collected. In embodiments, the device may also automate or assist with:
It is a further object of the current invention to fully characterize turf in a way sufficient to direct changes to the turf and/or shoes for improved performance and/or injury prevention. This mechanism will incorporate all or part of the tests in a controlled manner. By actuating test modes, the system can rely on the data being consistent across stadiums as human-to-human variability inherent in testing with manually powered devices is removed from the process. For example, the system may automatically restrict or fix degrees-of-freedom as appropriate for the desired test mode. The system may also automatically raise or lower the footform for the test, as appropriate. The system may also incorporate locational measurements of the top surface of the test surface into test actuation or data processing. To maintain safety, the system may display the current “state” of the system (for example, whether the system is safe for manual operations or ready to complete a test). Existing tests that will be automated are, by way of example only, surface hardness and/or energy absorption and/or return, infill depth and evenness, soil moisture content, surface shear resistance, and/or percentage ground cover detection. In addition to actuating existing tests, this improved system will also have temperature, pressure, and humidity sensors. Finally, the device will utilize a translation-rotation foot-form that can be shod with various footwear that in turn can engage with the ground to analyze shoe or cleat release dynamics.
The foot-form is representative of an athlete's foot in a cleat or shoe and is interchangeable for customizability. This extremity may have roll, pitch, and yaw adjustability to collect data on varying cleat-to-turf interface angles, as well as allow adjustment in the angle of the “toe” of the footform relative to the rest of the footform to approximate flexion of the foot about the MTP joint, yet hold these adjustments fixed in a static pose while testing is occurring. This end effector will be attached to its translation and rotation actuation mechanism via a multi-axis load cell, in aspects. This load cell will collect force and moment data on the foot-form as it moves relative to the turf via, for example, a data acquisition unit. The data collector, such as a computer, will also be recording data from rotational and translational displacement sensors to detect linear position and velocity of the shoe as well as angular rotations and velocities of the shoe. Accelerations of the foot-form may also be measured to either characterize the interaction of the shoe with the turf or, alternatively, to allow characterization of the inertial effects of the device during testing.
In other embodiments, the invention described herein is an apparatus configured to apply controlled horizontal and vertical forces and rotational moments to an end effector (footform) as prescribed, wherein the applied forces and moments mimic a behavior of a human foot or other body part during an athletic movement or reflect forces and/or moments associated with injury and/or performance of a subject's foot or other body part (e.g., the loads generated by football players in the NFL), wherein applying and measuring interactions between prescribed forces, rotational moments, and rotational and linear displacements allows for a safety and/or performance evaluation of a subject, athletic apparel, or an athletic playing surface.
In another embodiment, the invention described herein is an apparatus configured to apply controlled horizontal, vertical, and/or rotational displacements to an end effector (footform) as prescribed, wherein the applied displacements mimic a behavior of a human foot or other body part during an athletic movement or reflect displacements associated with injury and/or performance of a subject's foot or other body part (e.g., motion profiles resulting from athletic tasks resulting in foot/surface interaction during football playing), wherein applying and measuring interactions between prescribed forces, rotational moments, and rotational and linear displacements allows for a safety and/or performance evaluation of a subject, athletic apparel, or an athletic playing surface.
The accompanying drawings illustrate certain aspects of embodiments of the present invention and should not be used to limit the invention. Together with the written description the drawings explain certain principles of the invention.
Reference will now be made in detail to various exemplary embodiments of the invention. It is to be understood that the following discussion of exemplary embodiments is not intended as a limitation on the invention. Rather, the following discussion is provided to give the reader a more detailed understanding of certain aspects and features of the invention.
The present invention can be described in terms of, for example, a foot-form assembly that is preloaded into the ground or turf sample via a tunable vertical load actuator. The apparatus and associated system can impose a constant and/or dynamic or variable horizontal force (and/or rotational torque) on the foot-form assembly while collecting motion profile data on the cleat/shoe as it engages and releases from the turf. In addition to measurement of the displacements associated with applied forces, the system is also capable of logging the minimum required force required to achieve such release from the turf fibers, infill, and overall construction. The minimum force required for cleat/shoe motion relative to the turf matters because this value potentially represents the forces that a player's leg or other body part will experience when loaded in a similar manner to an athlete representative system. This data, along with existing tests results (which will be automated, in aspects), will all be recorded and saved, in aspects. This data can be used to identify the differences in quality of synthetic turf, and the quality of athletic apparel, during injury (or non-injury) compared to the characteristics of natural turf, synthetic turf, non-injury situations, and/or safer or less safe athletic apparel. In addition to data collected during the shoe-turf interaction test, characteristics of the shoe or turf used for the test can be saved and linked with the test data.
The current invention allows for closed-loop control, wherein the system is capable of monitoring force or torque being applied and controlling the force or torque in order to, in aspects, maintain a constantly applied force or torque in a controlled and constant manner. However, in aspects, the apparatus does not necessarily need to provide force or torque in a constant manner and situations may arise where force or torque will not be applied in such a manner; rather the applied force or torque will be variable and/or adjustable. In aspects, the system measures impedance, such that it applies displacement or velocities and measures forces/torques, for example. The system may also apply and measure admittance, therein applying a force/torque and measuring displacement or velocity; thus, the system may be configured to apply a particular force/torque in order to measure the impact on, for example, an athletic shoe, a human body or body part, and/or real or synthetic turf.
In some instances, the system will use prior data knowing what forces or torques typically, usually, or sometimes cause injury in order to maintain input force/torque applied by the apparatus to determine displacement or movement of a shoe, in aspects, for a given shoe-to-turf combination(s). In embodiments, this may result in a rating or ranking of a shoe and/or turf; in aspects, it can be a pass/fail test, meaning a determination is made whether an athlete can use a particular shoe or not (is it safe, or less safe, or is it unsafe?). Also, based on test results with a given cleat, shoe or generic representation of a shoe-turf interface, the system can verify condition and maintenance of a field, e.g., within tolerances.
In aspects, the current invention tests mechanical interactions between the cleat- or shoe-to-turf interface using a translation test and a rotation test, and force and motion data are recorded via data acquisition, and therefore the system is capable of recording accurate and repeatable results. In aspects, the apparatus is configured to collect on-field displacement, velocity, force and torque data, record impact hardness, measure infill (turf), analyze surface stability (grass), read surface moisture content, perform visual inspection (e.g., via camera or drone), and/or upload or download data manually or automatically.
In aspects, the apparatus processes and displays data tailored for a certain target audience. In aspects, there might be some “hard-coded” data with some data analysis built in locally, remotely, or on a server. In another example, the analysis may be performed online via analysis of metadata stored in a server.
The system is capable of objectively scoring surfaces and footwear, and evaluating geographical compliance of a surface with a standard or protocol (using, for example, GPS to evaluate an entire field area or a portion of a field area and recommending localized intervention/maintenance).
Turning to the figures, in
In
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In further aspects of the invention, the apparatus can be configured to include some or all of the mentioned elements such as line marking, magnetic FOD detection, infill sweeping, testing infill for bacteria agents, automatic data uploading to server, automated all user processes, fully autonomous system, and/or drone assist full field inspection from above.
As shown in
Design schematics comprise several other Figures.
In other embodiments of the invention, files comprising the set of computer-executable instructions may be stored in computer-readable memory on a single computer or distributed across multiple computers or involve a network of remote servers hosted on the internet. In aspects, local, edge, or remote computing possibilities are used to store, manage, and process data. A skilled artisan will further appreciate, in light of this disclosure, how the invention can be implemented, in addition to software, using hardware or firmware. As such, as used herein, the operations of the invention can be implemented in a system comprising a combination of software, hardware, or firmware.
Embodiments of this disclosure include one or more computers or devices loaded with a set of the computer-executable instructions described herein. The computers or devices may be a general-purpose computer, a special-purpose computer, or other programmable data processing apparatus to produce a particular machine, such that the one or more computers or devices are instructed and configured to carry out the calculations, processes, steps, operations, algorithms, statistical methods, formulas, or computational routines of this disclosure. The computer or device performing the specified calculations, processes, steps, operations, algorithms, statistical methods, formulas, or computational routines of this disclosure may comprise at least one processing element such as a central processing unit (i.e., processor) and a form of computer-readable memory which may include random-access memory (RAM) or read-only memory (ROM). The computer-executable instructions can be embedded in computer hardware or stored in the computer-readable memory such that the computer or device may be directed to perform one or more of the calculations, steps, processes, and operations depicted and/or described herein.
Additional embodiments of this disclosure comprise a computer system for carrying out the computer-implemented method of this disclosure. The computer system may comprise a processor for executing the computer-executable instructions, one or more electronic databases containing the data or information described herein, an input/output interface or user interface, and a set of instructions (e.g., software) for carrying out the method. The computer system can include a stand-alone computer, such as a desktop computer, a portable computer, such as a tablet, laptop, PDA, or smartphone, or a set of computers connected through a network including a client-server configuration and one or more database servers. The network may use any suitable network protocol, including IP, UDP, or ICMP, and may be any suitable wired or wireless network including any local area network, wide area network, Internet network, telecommunications network, Wi-Fi enabled network, or Bluetooth enabled network. In one embodiment, the computer system comprises a central computer connected to the internet that has the computer-executable instructions stored in memory that is operably connected to an internal electronic database. The central computer may perform the computer-implemented method based on input and commands received from remote computers through the internet. The central computer may effectively serve as a server and the remote computers may serve as client computers such that the server-client relationship is established, and the client computers issue queries or receive output from the server over a network.
The input/output interfaces may include a graphical user interface (GUI) which may be used in conjunction with the computer-executable code and electronic databases. The graphical user interface may allow a user to perform these tasks through the use of text fields, check boxes, pull-downs, command buttons, and the like. A skilled artisan will appreciate how such graphical features may be implemented for performing the tasks of this disclosure. The user interface may optionally be accessible through a computer connected to the internet. In one embodiment, the user interface is accessible by typing in an internet address through an industry standard web browser and logging into a web page. The user interface may then be operated through a remote computer (client computer) accessing the web page and transmitting queries or receiving output from a server through a network connection.
The present invention has been described with reference to particular embodiments having various features. In light of the disclosure provided above, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made in the practice of the present invention without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention. One skilled in the art will recognize that the disclosed features may be used singularly, in any combination, or omitted based on the requirements and specifications of a given application or design. When an embodiment refers to “comprising” certain features, it is to be understood that the embodiments can alternatively “consist of” or “consist essentially of” any one or more of the features. Other embodiments of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention.
It is noted that where a range of values is provided in this specification, each value between the upper and lower limits of that range is also specifically disclosed. The upper and lower limits of these smaller ranges may independently be included or excluded in the range as well. The singular forms “a,” “an,” and “the” include plural referents unless the context clearly dictates otherwise. It is intended that the specification and examples be considered as exemplary in nature and that variations that do not depart from the essence of the invention fall within the scope of the invention. Further, all of the references cited in this disclosure are each individually incorporated by reference herein in their entireties and as such are intended to provide an efficient way of supplementing the enabling disclosure of this invention as well as provide background detailing the level of ordinary skill in the art.
The present application relies on the disclosures of and claims priority to and the benefit of the filing date of U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/985,126, filed Mar. 4, 2020. The disclosures of that application are hereby incorporated by reference herein in their entireties. Information from the following related website is also hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety: https://www.figma.com/proto/PeRRW6ZRPMwgMkVAZ4n6yl/BEAST-UI?node-id=4%3A11&viewport=9974%2C-566%2C0.7194263339042664&scaling=min-zoom
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