EVALUATION OF THE GO METHOD WITHIN THE UPPER LIMB KINEMATICS ANALYSIS E. ROUX (1) – S. BOUILLAND (2) – A.-P. GODILLON-MAQUINGHEN (1) - D. BOUTTENS (2) (1) Laboratoire d’Automatique et de Mécanique Industrielles et Humaines, U.M.R. C.N.R.S. 8530 Université de Valenciennes, Le Mont Houy, 59313 VALENCIENNES Cedex 9 - France (2) Groupe Hopale, 62 608 BERCK SUR MER – France ABSTRACT The aim of this study is to assess the performances of the global optimisation (GO) method (Lu and O'Connor, 1999) within the upper limb kinematics analysis. First the model of the upper limb is presented. Then we apply GO method in order to reduce skin movement artefacts that imply relative movement between markers and bones. The performances of the method are then evaluated with the help of simulated movements of the upper limb. Results show a significant reduction of the errors and of the variability due to skin movement. KEY WORDS Upper limb kinematics, Optoelectronic system with external markers, Skin movement artefacts, Global optimisation, Simulated movement. - 1 -