In Vivo Analysis of Bone Strain using Fiber Bragg

Grating Sensor and Decision Tree Algorithm in

Bovine during Masticatory Movements
Leandro Zen Karam, Alessandra Kalinowski, Vinicius
Pegorini, Tangriani S. Assman, Richardson Ribeiro,
Fbio L. Bertotti, Rafael Cardoso, Jean Carlos
Cardozo da Silva, Hypolito J. Kalinowski

Christiano S. R. Pitta
Federal Institute of Paran
Palmas, Brazil

Federal University of Technology - Paran

Curitiba, Brazil
Abstract This study focused on the development of a
biosensor able to follow the deformations of the bone tissue and
to allow for future studies in the areas of health sciences. The
biosensor is designed with a titanium mesh, which is fixed in the
jaws of the animal to be monitored. The animal received different
kinds of foods to allow analysis of the signal acquired during
feeding. The acquired signal was then subjected to a processing,
which has been classified and capable of identifying the animal
chewing process for each type of food. This technology has
application in grazing, and can be useful in studies related to
nutrition and animal health. The classification of the mastigatory
patterns is based on decision trees algorithm. The results
demonstrate that the sensor is effective and is able to capture the
differences in the deformation generated during the chewing
process, generating a signal that can be identified by the
algorithm presented.
KeywordsFiber Bragg gratings; biosensor; deformation;
pattern classification.

I.

INTRODUCTION

The development of fiber optic sensors for in vivo

monitoring of bone strain attracts the attention of several
research groups, with good forecasts about applying such
sensors to living beings [1][5]. The small characteristic
dimensions of optical fiber sensors enables applications in very
small regions, and, added to the chemical and electromagnetic
inertness of the optical fiber, these sensors do not induce
metabolic changes caused by classical transducers and
instrumentation process.
There is literature consensus about the fact that the
mechanical stress is a major contributor to the process of cell
differentiation, which sets the matrix between osteoblasts and
osteoclasts [6][8]. For the remodeling and bone regeneration
processes there should be the possibility of a quantitative
measure of bone deformation process, which would allow the
monitoring of deformations in a particular region of the bone
tissue during the periods of interest for health professionals.
The measure of bone deformation can be used in the
precision livestock to identify events related to ingestive

978-1-4673-9492-5 / 15 / $ 31,00 = 2015 IEEE

behavior of ruminants. The study of animal feeding behavior

has as one of its objectives evaluate the quality of food and
consequently select forages that provides an increase in the
weight gain, assisting in the growth, production and
reproduction [20].
Machine learning techniques can be applied on data
collected by sensors for the pattern classification. The use of
machine learning techniques allows to build systems capable of
acquiring knowledge automatically, using existing datasets to
improve their performance in a classification task [19].
For pattern classification it is used the C4.5 decision tree
algorithm, which uses supervised learning. The C4.5 algorithm
is known for its generalization capability when dealing with
noise data and works with continuous, categorical or missing
values [9].
This paper presents the development and application of a
new in vivo sensor to monitor the bone deformation and to test
the mechanical stress during the chewing process of a living
animal. For pattern classification of the masticatory movements
it is used machine learning techniques.
II. MATERIALS AND METHODS
The sensor used standard fiber Bragg gratings (FBG)
written in telecommunications grade single-mode optical fiber
(ESMF) from Draktel. The recording system consists of a
KrF excimer laser operating at 248 nm, 5 ns pulse width, and
pulse energy pulse of 7 mJ, 250 Hz repetition rate. An iris
opening of approximately 3 mm filtered the beam thus by
setting the length of the Bragg grating.
In the Fig. 1a, could be seen a titanium mesh, with
dimensions of 5 mm 15 mm, in order to act as a transducer.
The mesh is a courtesy of NEOORTHO for research
purposes. Was used a microporous medical tape to fix the FBG
at the titanium mesh, after the bonding process with
cyanoacrylate glue. A biocompatible silicone tube guides the
optical fiber that connects the biosensor to the interrogation
system. The tubing is from the same type used in the

manufacture of totally implantable catheters, provided by

IBEG company.
For the reported measurements it was used a 4 months aged
bovine, male and with a mass of 160 kg, from a property that
works in the dairy industry. The tests are performed with the
approval of the Ethics Committee on Animal Use of the
Federal University of Technology Paran (protocol CEUA
2013-009).
The animal remained in 24 hours solid and water intake, an
anesthetic (Xylazine 2%, at a dose of 0.3mg/kg ) is applied at
the initial stages of the procedure, until the pharmacological
effects of the drug are observed. Then an incision is performed
using a sterilized scalpel and D-steel blade size 22 cm. Other
surgical procedures are performed with the aid of a straight
scissors stainless tip blunt/blunt, rat tooth forceps size 16 cm,
Martin tweezers and a bone scraper. The fixation of the
biosensor is performed using two screws, suitable for use in the
particular titanium mesh, also available from NEOORTHO.
After fixing the sensor,,a simple suture, internal and external
points, is made using a needle type door 16 cm (Mayo Hegar),
a curved stainless steel needle, with a triangular tip and size
6cm between the ends and nylon thread size 2-0. Once the
surgical procedure is closed, to the animal it is applied
Oxytetracycline (dihydrate) 20% at a dose of 1 ml/10 kg body
mass by intra muscular route. The same dosage is applied two
times with an interval of 3 days between each, totaling three
applications. There was a seven days interval between the
surgical process and the feeding process for data acquisition.
The exact location of the sensor fixing, in bovine jaw, was
determined by Wosniak et al. [10], which explains the location
and the need to apply in a given area.
For the acquisition of optical signal and data collection, an
HBM DI410 interrogator is used with CatmanEasy software.,
The sampling rate used in the tests is 1,000 samples per
second. During data acquisition, the animal was constrained in
a space of approximately 3.5 m 3 m with a feeder, used to
supply all types of food to the animal. The bovine had partial
freedom for movements within the enclosure, limited to a
square measuring 2 m 2 m, to avoid any sudden movements
that might interfere with the measurement and signal
collection, or that could break the optical cable. Fig. 1b shows
a schematic drawing representing the experimental layout and
the location of the sensor mounting.
The first ingested material was cattle ration, during
13 minutes. Then hay a mixture of dried grasses and
vegetables is served, ingested for an approximate time of
10 minutes. The hay is used as fodder (food) for livestock, after
going through a process of dehydration that removes water
contents but retains the nutritional value and allows storage for
long periods without damage to the animal. Hay quality is
directly related to the ratio between the quantity of leaves and
stalks [11], [12].
The next feeding is done with a portion of ryegrass during
an approximate intake time of 5 minutes. Ryegrass is a kind of
grass that is highly palatable to animals, presenting high levels
of protein, excellent digestibility and mineral composition.
Ryegrass is a plant with regrowth and resistance to grazing, so
is widely used in livestock and dairy industry [13], [14].

After the chewing process of the three types of provided

food, the animal rested for about 45 minutes until it started the
rumination process lasting approximately 15 minutes.
Rumination is the chewing of food that is regurgitated, a
characteristic process of ruminants [15][17].
The sensor signals are analyzed in accordance with the
video samples taken during the feeding of the animal,
correlated to the type of material that was being consumed at
all times. After data acquisition, a random choice of a 3s
interval was performed.

(a)

(b)

Fig. 1. Photograph of the designed sensor, here positioned in a bovine skull.

(b) Schematic design of the setup used in the in vivo experiment.

The acquired signals were used to build a dataset with a

total of 1000 instances with 200 samples of each class, wherein
each instance has 1016 attributes. The first 1000 attributes of
each instance is formed by the samples of the signal and the 16
remaining attributes were formed by the frequency components
of a signal obtained from the FFT [18]. During the creation of
the dataset, it was observed that chewing movement periods
were between 0.3 and 1.0 second. If chewing movement period
lasts less than 1 second, the average value of one period of the
signal was padded in order to complete 1000 attributes of one
instance, and the FFT values was padded in the 16 remaining
attributes, in order to complete the 1016 attributes.
The dataset were used to build a decision tree classifier for
recognizing chewing patterns using the C4.5 algorithm [9]. In
the division of the dataset into training and test sets to generate
the decision tree was used cross-validation k-fold [19], which
was used to evaluate the ability of generalization of the
generated decision tree classifier from the datasets used for
training and testing. The tests were performed using crossvalidation with 10-fold.
A decision tree has his structure formed by nodes (vertices)
that represent the attributes of an instance, by branches from
these nodes, that receive the possible values of the attributes
and terminal nodes (leaf nodes), representing different classes
present in the dataset. The classification consists in follow the
path taken by the successive nodes arranged along the tree until
it reached a terminal node, which contains the class to assign
the respective instance [9].
The C4.5 algorithm uses the attributes that generate higher
information gain ratio for choice of decision tree nodes [9]. The
information gain ratio is calculated by the relative gain of each

node and the way in which each attribute divides the data
(information division), as proposed by [9].
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Fig. 2 shows the peak wavelength of the Bragg grating
sensor as a function of time for the mastication process of the
animal while feeding with the different types of food. The FBG
wavelength is proportional to the mechanical deformation in
the sensor attachment region, due to the effective photo-elastic
constant. The higher the amplitude of the signal (measured
from the baseline) the higher is the mechanical stress on the
jaw bone. It can be clearly seen that the signal depends on the
hardness of the material chewed by the animal. Another
important factor affecting the signal is the range of movements
that the animal needs to perform to complete the chewing
motion.
By checking the chewed material, it is known that there is
no material that needs big and strong muscle contractions since
there is no need to pass through the material tearing process.
The frequency of chewing is related to the fibrous amount
of the material. A more fibrous material tends to require a
higher frequency for mastication, in order to soften the food to
be swallowed.
Specifically in the analysis of the chewing when the animal
is feed with cattle ration one can notice a more irregular
response from the sensor. The cause is probably associated to
painful inhibitory reflexes, caused by the biting a harder
material. Such reflexes induce an abrupt loss of the masticatory
force and a stretch in the periodontal ligament, which, in turn,
causes an automatic loosening of the animals jaw grip to avoid
injuring the teeth.

Examining Fig. 2b, it can be seen that there is a significant

change in the wavelength shift for the light reflected by the
FBG. During the hay chewing process the sensor wavelength
shift measured 0.26 nm, a value that corresponds to a strain of
approximately 220 strain transmitted from the bone tissue to
the FBG.
For the feeding with ryegrass shown on Fig. 2c it can be
seen that the change in the reflected wavelength lies in the
order of 0.16 nm, which means that the strain transmitted by
the bone tissue to the sensor is around 135 strain. During the
bovine feeding process, there were three types of food, and the
ryegrass was the only one given in its natural condition, thus
this material had a large water concentration. The ryegrass
average density is comparable to that of the other provided
food, but it has low hardness and it also presents the
concentration of natural food fibers. With this softer material,
the animal performed movements of small amplitude during
the chewing.
In the later 15 min of analysis (data is shown on Fig. 2d)
the animal chew during the rumination process. The graph
shows that the signal amplitude is small, due to low level of
strain. As the food was already chewed, the material for the
rumination process is returned to the animal's mouth, well
soaked with saliva, forming a softer paste that is chewed and
thus presents lower strain to the jaw. The measured change in
the reflected wavelength is ~ 0,04 nm, which corresponds to a
strain of approximately 35 strain.
The results obtained with the C4.5 algorithm after training
and testing can be seen in the confusion matrix exhibited in
Table 1. The diagonal cells of the table show the number of
correctly classified cases, and the cells above and below the
diagonal, show the number of misclassified cases.
TABLE I.

CONFUSION MATRIX: CLASSIFICATION RATES AFTER

TRAINING AND VALIDATION. (1) CATTLE RATION; (2) HAY; (3) RYEGRASS; (4)
RUMINATION; (5) IDLE PERIOD

(a)

(b)

1
2
3

(c)

(d)

Fig. 2. Graphs depicting the sensor wavelength as a function of time during

chewing the different supplied food: (a) cattle ration, (b) hay; (c) ryegrass and,
(d) during the rumination.

The wavelength change perceived in the graph of Fig 2a is

approximately 0.04 nm, which means a deformation in the
bone tissue of 35 strain, whereas the thermal change can be
considered irrelevant (even if there is cross-sensitivity, the
body temperature of the animal remained constant during the
experiment).

4
5

172
(86%)
4

0
(0%)
196

24
(12%)
0

4
(2%)
0

0
(0%)
0

(2%)

(98%)

(0%)

(0%)

(0%)

24

172

(12%)

(2%)

(86%)

(0%)

(0%)

200

(0%)

(0%)

(0%)

(100%)

(0%)

200

(0%)

(0%)

(0%)

(0%)

(100%)

The decision tree classifier provided an average

classification success rate of 94%. The set of rules generated by
the decision tree allowed to classify correctly most of the
instances collected among the five chewing patterns.
Rumination, idle period and hay had the best classification
results. The samples of these materials had different

wavelength values, providing the best classification results.

During the rumination the structure of the bolus is doughy,
which facilitates the chewing process, and during idle period,
there was no food between the dental arch, during this period
the animal applied less mandibular force whereas hay has a
more rigid structure, because it was provided dehydrated.
Cattle ration and ryegrass had the lowest success rate. This is
related to the characteristics of each class. The cattle ration is
composed of small grains, which facilitates the food intake by
the animal, requiring lower jaw forces involved. The ryegrass
had a high concentration of water, resulting in a softer material.
IV. CONCLUSIONS
It is shown that the designed FBG sensor can be applied to
in vivo analysis of physiological processes. The obtained
signals have good signal do noise ratio, permitting the data
acquisition for long periods of animal feeding and providing
information about the associated chewing. The sensor response
shows the dependence of the chewing force (through the bone
deformation) and frequency to the hardness and fibrous
contents of the given food. Anomalous response due to pain
can be perceived in the harder material chewing.
The chewing forces information provided by the FBG
sensors were used by a decision tree algorithm to build a
classifier. The average success classification rate obtained was
94%, that corroborates the effectiveness of the proposed
classifier. This is because the set of rules induced was capable
of generalize the patterns in the animal nutrition-related events,
such as idle period and rumination, and also in the chewing
data for different types of food. These information are
important for studies related to animal health and welfare.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors are grateful to CAPES, CNPq, FINEP and
Fundao Araucria by financial support.
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