Spatiotemporal laser speckle flowmetry based on elastic-walled U-shaped tubing apparatus: Optical method for urinary flow measurement

We propose an optical method for uroflowmetry, exploiting the laser speckle contrast imaging (LSCI) technique onto an intermediate tubing apparatus having an elastic wall that can sensitively respond to flow-induced shedding vortices. Based on the method, we devised and fabricated an elastic-walled U-shaped tubing apparatus (EWUSTA), using the three-dimensional printing technique. We utilized the spatiotemporal contrast scheme for the LSCI as a fast and reliable computational algorithm. We investigated three different materials of flex-vinyl, ninja-flex, and natural rubber latex for the elastic wall of the EWUSTA in steady flow conditions, and verified that their optimal operational ranges could extend up to 7, 15, and 25 ml/s, respectively. We characterized the natural-rubber-latex-based EWUSTA in dynamic flow conditions in comparison with a commercial reservoir-weight-transducer-based gravimetric flowmeter, and verified its feasibility. We stress that the proposed method can offer precise and accurate information on flow dynamics. In addition, we found that the upper limit of the optimal operational range of the proposed apparatus had strong correlation with the tensile strength of the elastic-wall material. We reckon that the proposed and demonstrated method has great potential not only for uroflowmetry but also for other flow-related medical and industrial applications.