Validation of 2 noninvasive, markerless reconstruction techniques in biplane high-speed fluoroscopy for 3-dimensional research of bovine distal limb kinematics

Abstract

Lameness severely impairs cattle's locomotion, and it is among the most important threats to animal welfare, performance, and productivity in the modern dairy industry. However, insight into the pathological alterations of claw biomechanics leading to lameness and an understanding of the biomechanics behind development of claw lesions causing lameness are limited. Biplane high-speed fluoroscopic kinematography is a new approach for the analysis of skeletal motion. Biplane high-speed videos in combination with bone scans can be used for 3-dimensional (3D) animations of bones moving in 3D space. The gold standard, marker-based animation, requires implantation of radio-opaque markers into bones, which impairs the practicability for lameness research in live animals. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to evaluate the comparative accuracy of 2 noninvasive, markerless animation techniques (semi-automatic and manual) in 3D animation of the bovine distal limb. Tantalum markers were implanted into each of the distal, middle, and proximal phalanges of 5 isolated bovine distal forelimbs, and biplane high-speed x-ray videos of each limb were recorded to capture the simulation of one step. The limbs were scanned by computed tomography to create bone models of the 6 digital bones, and 3D animation of the bones' movements were subsequently reconstructed using the marker-based, the semi-automatic, and the manual animation techniques. Manual animation translational bias and precision varied from 0.63 ± 0.26 mm to 0.80 ± 0.49 mm, and rotational bias and precision ranged from 2.41 ± 1.43° to 6.75 ± 4.67°. Semi-automatic translational values for bias and precision ranged from 1.26 ± 1.28 mm to 2.75 ± 2.17 mm, and rotational values varied from 3.81 ± 2.78° to 11.7 ± 8.11°. In our study, we demonstrated the successful application of biplane high-speed fluoroscopic kinematography to gait analysis of bovine distal limb. Using the manual animation technique, kinematics can be measured with sub-millimeter accuracy without the need for invasive marker implantation.

Does the range of motion in the bovine interphalangeal joints change with flooring condition? A pilot study using biplane high-speed fluoroscopic kinematography

“…It proves the applicability of biplane high-speed fluoroscopic kinematography to bovine gait analysis in vivo. The noninvasive application of radiopaque markers to the outside of the horn capsules facilitated a more expeditious and most likely even more accurate data processing than recently stated by Weiss et al (2017).…”

“…Results regarding the differences between ROM are trends, as not all differences exceeded the measurement error determined by Weiss et al (2017).…”

“…Spatial calibration as well as distortion correction were accomplished using recordings of a 3-D calibration cube and perforated stainless steel grids (Brainerd et al, 2010;Weiss et al, 2017) in XMALab 1.3.3 (Knorlein et al, 2016).…”

“…The determined marker transformations were then combined with the marker coordinates originating from the CT data to animate the horn capsules in Autodesk Maya version 2014 (Autodesk Inc., San Rafael, CA). Subsequently, one animation hierarchy (Gatesy et al, 2010;Weiss et al, 2017) per digit was established with the horn capsule and bones in neutral CT position. The horn capsule served as leading structure, distal, middle, and proximal phalanx followed one after another.…”

“…In combination with computed tomography (CT) bone models, this method facilitates the generation and analysis of 3-dimensional (3-D) animations of bones, including the visualization of the distal phalanx through the surrounding horn capsule (Panagiotopoulou et al, 2016;Geiger et al, 2018). Using a noninvasive reconstruction technique suitable for in vivo application, this method allows for measurements of joint kinematics of the DIPJ and PIPJ with a translational accuracy of 0.6 ± 0.3 mm to 0.8 ± 0.5 mm for the first time (Weiss et al, 2017).…”