Force plate for measuring small animal forces by digital speckle pattern interferometry

This paper presents a force plate specially designed for measuring ground reaction forces in small animals. Digital Speckle Pattern Interferometry (DSPI) is used to measure the plate deformation produced by the animal. Elasticity theory is used to obtain force magnitude and application position from the vertical displacement field measured with DSPI. The force plate has been tested with static weights of 5g and 10g at various locations on the plate. Some experiments with 20g body weight transgenic mice are also reported.