Sports medicine, orthopaedics
- 1:00-3:00 p.m. Monday, Oct. 20
- Buses depart from Hilton
- Free (registration required)
- Limit: 20 participants
Athletes move their bodies in amazing and unusual ways, and Ohio State’s Sports Health & Performance Institute is equipped to help them make the most of their moves—as well as prevent injury. Almost 5,000 square feet of laboratory space is devoted to simulating real-life sports environments such as a pitcher’s mound, golfing tee box, batting cage or running track so researchers can study the motion of athletes’ bodies and the forces acting at their joints. The labs employ high-speed motion-capture cameras that can record split-second movements; hidden force plates embedded in the floor record forces acting on each foot. Additional equipment records muscle activation and strength. Large projection screens allow trainers and therapists to give real-time feedback. Though the emphasis is on sports performance and injuries, an interdisciplinary team of researchers also uses the labs to investigate rehabilitation approaches on a variety of musculoskeletal diseases, evaluating orthopaedic implants and surgical techniques.