A physical model of muscle working to evaluate the work ability

It was well known that work ability included a wide kind of related aspects, involving both mental and physical well-being. When mechanical works were taken into account, it was necessary to refer to muscular structure and its consistency, for assessing the work ability and employability; i.e. efficiency of performances of the muscles has to be expressed in terms of physiological parameters representing the best expression of physical health. To enhance the existence of idoneous relationships between the muscle operation and the work ability, it should be necessary to point out a specific physical model of muscle motor enabling to correlate physiological parameters involved in the muscle operation to the physical quantities usually employed for estimating the work made by a machine. The authors have evaluated a mechanical model of the muscle motor, which allowed them to include the isometric and isotonic contractions, the primitive role of osmotic exchanges and the presence of energy dissipation, also in the presence of elastic forces, avoiding the so constructed model to have conservative nature. The so developed model, virtually animated using specific interactive software to reproduce the effective muscular behaviour during limbs' movements, has appeared extremely suitable both for educational and scientific aim.