Non-contact detection of physiological characteristics of experimental animals

1. A respiration rate detector for determining a rate of respiration of an experimental animal, the respiration rate detector comprising:

one or more optical detectors to observe an experimental animal and generate a video signal relating to the experimental animal; and

a controller to:

process the video signal to determine an optical flow of the video signal and generate an optical-flow signal,

process the optical-flow signal to determine a spatial region-of-interest of the optical-flow signal, the spatial region-of-interest comprising one or more spatial cells of the optical-flow signal, wherein processing the optical-flow signal to determine the spatial region-of-interest comprises evaluating the optical-flow signal in frequency space and selecting one or more spatial cells having a value in frequency space that exceeds a threshold value,

analyze the optical-flow signal within the spatial region-of-interest to determine the respiration rate of the experimental animal based on a detected repetitive movement of the experimental animal, and

display the determined respiration rate to an operator,

wherein the respiration rate is detected without requiring physical contact with the experimental animal.

2. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is adapted to encode the optical flow as two two-dimensional floating-point matrices.

3. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is adapted to determine the spatial region-of-interest such that the spatial cells of the spatial region-of-interest have periodic movement of at least a threshold magnitude within a predefined frequency range.

4. The respiration rate detector of claim 3 , wherein the controller is adapted to enhance the spatial region-of-interest by connected component analysis to identify a continuous subregion of an image.

5. The respiration rate detector of claim 3 , wherein the controller is adapted to subtract, from the signal within the determined spatial region-of-interest, a noise floor obtained from spatial cells that are outside of the determined set.

6. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is adapted to define spatial cells that have a size of from 0.001 cm 2 to 400 cm 2 .

7. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is adapted to determine a temporal region-of-interest of the optical-flow signal, during which the experimental animal is estimated to be in a tranquil state.

8. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is adapted to identify a local peak of periodic movement within a preselected frequency range corresponding to a range of possible expected respiration rates of the experimental animal.

9. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is adapted to synthesize image frames of the video from different camera perspectives and generate an optical-flow signal based on the synthesized video.

10. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is adapted to compute the optical flow from the video signal by a correlation method.

11. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein determining the spatial region-of-interest comprises one or more of reducing and enlarging the spatial region-of-interest before analyzing the optical-flow signal within the reduced and/or enlarged spatial region-of-interest to determine the respiration rate.

12. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein determining the spatial region-of-interest comprises determining a spatial region-of-interest that corresponds to two or more experimental animals, and wherein analyzing the optical-flow signal within the spatial region-of-interest comprises analyzing the optical-flow signal to determine the respiration rate of a single one of the two or more experimental animals based on a detected repetitive movement of that experimental animal.

13. The respiration rate detector of claim 1 , wherein the controller is further adapted to determine a confidence level in relation to the determined respiration rate and to display the confidence level to the operator.

14. A method of determining a rate of respiration of an experimental animal, the method comprising:

observing an experimental animal with one or more optical detectors to generate a video signal;

processing the video signal to determine an optical flow of the video signal and generate an optical-flow signal;

processing the optical-flow signal to determine a spatial region-of-interest of the optical-flow signal, the spatial region-of-interest comprising one or more spatial cells of the optical-flow signal, wherein processing the optical-flow signal to determine the spatial region-of-interest comprises evaluating the optical-flow signal in frequency space and selecting one or more spatial cells having a value in frequency space that exceeds a threshold value;

analyzing the optical-flow signal to determine the respiration rate of the experimental animal based on a detected repetitive movement of the experimental animal; and

displaying the determined respiration rate to an operator,

wherein the respiration rate is detected without requiring physical contact with the experimental animal.

15. The method of claim 14 , wherein processing the video signal comprises encoding the optical flow as two two-dimensional floating-point matrices.

16. The method of claim 14 , wherein analyzing the optical-flow signal comprises determining the spatial region-of-interest such that the spatial cells of the spatial region-of-interest have periodic movement of at least a threshold magnitude within a predefined frequency range.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein analyzing the optical-flow signal comprises enhancing the spatial region-of-interest by connected component analysis to identify a continuous subregion of an image.

18. The method of claim 16 , wherein analyzing the optical-flow signal comprises subtracting, from the signal within the determined spatial region-of-interest, a noise floor obtained from spatial cells that are outside of the determined set.

19. The method of claim 14 , wherein processing the video signal comprises defining spatial cells that have a size of from 0.001 cm 2 to 400 cm 2 .

20. The method of claim 14 , wherein analyzing the optical-flow signal comprises selecting a temporal region-of-interest during which the experimental animal is estimated to be in a tranquil state.

21. The method of claim 14 , wherein analyzing the optical-flow signal comprises identifying a local peak of periodic movement within a preselected frequency range corresponding to a range of possible expected respiration rates of the experimental animal.

22. The method of claim 14 , wherein processing the video signal comprises synthesizing image frames of the video from different camera perspectives and generating an optical-flow signal based on the synthesized video.

23. The method of claim 14 , wherein processing the video signal comprises computing the optical flow from the video signal by a correlation method.

24. The method of claim 14 , wherein processing the optical-flow signal to determine the spatial region-of-interest comprises one or more of reducing and enlarging the spatial region-of-interest before analyzing the optical-flow signal within the reduced and/or enlarged spatial region-of-interest to determine the respiration rate.

25. The method of claim 14 , wherein determining the spatial region-of-interest comprises determining a spatial region-of-interest that corresponds to two or more experimental animals, and wherein analyzing the optical-flow signal comprises analyzing the optical-flow signal to determine the respiration rate of a single one of the two or more experimental animals based on a detected repetitive movement of that experimental animal.

26. The method of claim 14 , further comprising determining a confidence level in relation to the determined respiration rate and displaying the confidence level to the operator.