Coursework
A wide variety of courses is available to help prepare students to conduct research in the OSU Neuromuscular Biomechanics Lab. Listed below are some of the basic courses of interest. This list is not exhaustive, and new courses in biomechanics and medical device design will be created over the next few years at Ohio State.
Biomechanics Courses in Mechanical Engineering
ME 565- Senior Capstone Design
A three-course series that allows students to design and prototype assistive devices for persons with disabilities. Collaboration with students and faculty from Occupational Therapy and Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation.
Click here for a listing of past and current projects
ME 687- Introduction to Musculoskeletal Biomechanics
Fundamental anatomy and physiology. Mechanics of muscle, tendon, ligament, meniscus, and bone. Equations of motion for human movement. Introduction to experimental techniques in musculoskeletal biomechanics.
ME 787- Neuromuscular Biomechanics
Mechanics and neural control of movement. State-of-the-art assessment of upper and lower extremity dynamics. Emphasis on rehabilitation and design of assistive devices for movement disorders.
Biomechanics Courses in Other Departments
Anatomy 693- Anatomy for Engineers
An overview of human anatomy is presented in a course especially designed for engineers. Lectures are complemented by dissection labs.
Anatomy 750- Radiologic Anatomy
An overview of basic imaging techniques like X-ray, CT, and MRI. The anatomy of individual body regions will be studied as each appears in images obtained using the different techniques. Imaging is very frequently used in biomechanics, and this class will help you identify key anatomic structures.
Anatomy 850- Injury Biomechanics
A discussion based seminar exploring new methods and research in injury biomechanics.
BME 741- Tissue Mechanics
Mechanical characterization of biological tissues at the organ and system level; exploration of interactions with physiological and pathological conditions. Students have commented that the course is a nice complement to ME 687.
EEOB 232- Introductory Physiology (for undergrads)
A survey of the human nervous system, sense organs, muscle function, circulation, respiration, digestion, metabolism, kidney function, and reproduction. The course is offered very early in the morning, but it is a terrific introduction to the body for undergraduates.
Other Useful Courses in Mechanical Engineering
ME 639- Applied Finite Element Method
Overview of finite element method, description of finite element software, modeling requirements and techniques, analysis using general purpose software, case studies. Every mechanical engineer should have a basic understanding of how to run a finite element analysis.
ME 682- Product Design Fundamentals
Principles of current engineering, design for manufacturing and assembly, concept generation and evaluation, design prototyping. A great class that will help you to think about things differently.
ME 683- CAD/CAM Laboratory for Rapid Prototyping
Rapid prototyping using CAD/CAM software and the CNC milling machines in the student machine shop. A great class that will help you to think about things differently. Similar to ME 639, I think that every mechanical engineer should have a basic understanding of these skills.
ME 733- Advanced Engineering Dynamics
Rigid body kinematics and dynamics, rotation transformations, Euler angles.
ME 752- Mechanical Design of Manipulators and Robots
Principles of hardware and software design of industrial robots and related devices; includes use of actual industrial robot programming procedures.
ME 761- Optimization in Mechanical Design
Application of analytical optimization methods to the solution of deterministic and probabilistic mechanical design problems.
Useful Courses in Other Departments
Math 571- Linear Algebra
Linear algebra techniques are frequently used in biomechanics. This course provides a good introduction to the field.
Statistics 641- Design and Analysis of Experiments
The linaer model for experimental designs and analysis of variance. These tools are quite useful for analyzing data in biomechanics.
Statistics 645- Applied Regression Analysis
Simple and multiple linear regression. These tools are quite useful for analyzing data in biomechanics.
