Optical flow techniques with peak detection method for ciliary beat frequency measurement

The transport of mucous in the ciliary mucosa can be measured by observing ciliary movements. The conventional method for measuring ciliary beat frequency is to record with a high-speed digital video camera and then apply difference image analysis. We compared this method to the optical flow technique with peak detection analysis. We examined 50 human nasal mucosa samples using both techniques, and found that the accuracy of the optical flow technique was 90.15%, while that of the conventional method was 84.82%.