February 6, 2019
Arne Meyer and colleagues recently shared their design and implementation of a head-mounted camera system for capturing detailed behavior in freely moving mice.
Video monitoring of animals can give great insight to behaviors. Most video monitoring systems to collect precise behavioral data require fixed position cameras and stationary animals, which can limit observation of natural behaviors. To address this, Meyer et al. developed a system which combines a lightweight head-mounted camera and head-movement sensors to detect behaviors in mice. The system, built using commercially available and 3D printed parts, can be used to monitor a variety of subtle behaviors including eye position, whisking, and ear movements in unrestrained animals. Furthermore, this device can be mounted in combination with neural implants for recording brain activity.
Read more here! You can also check out their github here. Documentation and files are also available on OpenEphys here.