Subspace Identification and Classification of Healthy Human Gait

Purpose: The classification between different gait patterns is a frequent task in gait assessment. The base vectors were usually found using principal component analysis (PCA) is replaced by an iterative application of the support vector machine (SVM). The aim was to use classifyability instead of variability to build a subspace (SVM space) that contains the information about classifiable aspects of a movement. The first discriminant of the SVM space will be compared to a discriminant found by an independent component analysis (ICA) in the SVM space. Methods: Eleven runners ran using shoes with different midsoles. Kinematic data, representing the movements during stance phase when wearing the two shoes, was used as input to a PCA and SVM. The data space was decomposed by an iterative application of the SVM into orthogonal discriminants that were able to classify the two movements. The orthogonal discriminants spanned a subspace, the SVM space. It represents the part of the movement that allowed classifying the two conditions. The data in the SVM space was reconstructed for a visual assessment of the movement difference. An ICA was applied to the data in the SVM space to obtain a single discriminant. Cohen's d effect size was used to rank the PCA vectors that could be used to classify the data, the first SVM discriminant or the ICA discriminant. Results: The SVM base contains all the information that discriminates the movement of the two shod conditions. It was shown that the SVM base contains some redundancy and a single ICA discriminant was found by applying an ICA in the SVM space. Conclusions: A combination of PCA, SVM and ICA is best suited to extract all parts of the gait pattern that discriminates between the two movements and to find a discriminant for the classification of dichotomous kinematic data.