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BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article

Front. Med.
Sec. Family Medicine and Primary Care
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fmed.2024.1485450
This article is part of the Research Topic Body Composition Assessment and Future Disease Risk View all 6 articles

Smartphone Three-Dimensional Imaging for Body Composition Assessment Using Non-Rigid Avatar Reconstruction

Provisionally accepted
Grant M. Tinsley Grant M. Tinsley 1*Christian Rodriguez Christian Rodriguez 1Christine M. Florez Christine M. Florez 1Madelin R. Siedler Madelin R. Siedler 1Ethan Tinoco Ethan Tinoco 1Cassidy McCarthy Cassidy McCarthy 2Steven B. Heymsfield Steven B. Heymsfield 2
  • 1 Texas Tech University, Lubbock, United States
  • 2 Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Background: Modern digital anthropometry applications utilize smartphone cameras to rapidly construct three-dimensional humanoid avatars, quantify relevant anthropometric variables, and estimate body composition.In the present study, 131 participants ([73 M, 58 F] age 33.7 ± 16.0 y; BMI 27.3 ± 5.9 kg/m 2 , body fat 29.9 ± 9.9%) had their body composition assessed using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) and a smartphone 3D scanning application using non-rigid avatar reconstruction. The performance of two new body fat % estimation equations was evaluated through reliability and validity statistics, Bland-Altman analysis, and equivalence testing.In the reliability analysis, the technical error of the measurement and intraclass correlation coefficient were 0.5 to 0.7% and 0.996 to 0.997, respectively. Both estimation equations demonstrated statistical equivalence with DXA based on ±2% equivalence regions and strong linear relationships (Pearson's r 0.90; concordance correlation coefficient 0.89 to 0.90). Across equations, mean absolute error and standard error of the estimate values were ~3.5% and ~4.2%, respectively. No proportional bias was observed.While continual advances are likely, smartphone-based 3D scanning may now be suitable for implementation for rapid and accessible body measurement in a variety of applications.

    Keywords: 3D scanning, body fat, smartphone, optical imaging, Digital anthropometry

    Received: 23 Aug 2024; Accepted: 25 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Tinsley, Rodriguez, Florez, Siedler, Tinoco, McCarthy and Heymsfield. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Grant M. Tinsley, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, United States

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.