Behavioral snapshots
Short tests capture only fragments, missing disease progression and circadian dynamics.
Needs a continuous observation window
BA-NextCage
Multimodal Home-cage Phenotyping System
AI-driven multimodal animal phenotyping platform. Real-time analysis of ten fine behaviors and 3D kinematics across multiple animals, with 24/7 home-cage monitoring, individual food and water intake tracking, and automated body temperature and weight measurements.
Research context
Ethology needs a longer observation window
Traditional behavioral studies often rely on short tests conducted outside the home cage. Handling and unfamiliar test settings can alter natural behavior, while manual observation add further bias. These limitations make it difficult to follow disease progression over time. They also obscure circadian activity patterns and natural social behavior. With the growing use of chronic disease models and longitudinal drug studies, researchers need low-disturbance systems that support continuous observation and provide a more natural, comprehensive view of the animal phenotype.
Identity confusion
Group-housed animals are easily misidentified, undermining individual-level tracking.
Needs stable multi-animal identity
Hard to quantify
Manual observation makes fine behaviors and social interaction noisy and hard to reproduce.
Needs objective quantification
Siloed data
Behavior, physiology, and environment stay siloed, preventing unified phenotyping.
Needs multimodal alignment
Manual review
Long-duration videos require extensive manual annotation and review.
Needs automated analysis
Poor stability
Systems struggle to maintain reliable operation during long-term experiment, disrupting longitudinal studies.
Needs reliable continuous capture
Research needs have outgrown traditional methods
Why it matters
Longitudinal
Chronic disease needs continuous longitudinal evaluation
Efficacy
Drug discovery needs more sensitive digital phenotypes
Translation
Preclinical research needs greater reproducibility and translational value
Welfare
Animal welfare requires less handling and human disturbance
Multimodal
Complex disease research requires integrated analysis of behavioral, physiological, and environmental data.
Deployment
AI and edge computing now make real-time multimodal analysis product-ready
Technical leadership
The first HomeCage AI platform for fine-grained behavioral phenotyping
Core technology stems from Nature Communications research. Built on 3D computer vision and multidimensional time-series analysis, the platform turns complex behavioral patterns into a computational framework for quantitative digital phenotyping, leading in technical innovation, scientific rigor, and industrialization.
AI vision & deep pose estimation
Multi-camera sync capture and 3D reconstruction enable robust tracking of joints, poses, and trajectories across species.
Ethogram-inspired computing framework
Pose → action → ethogram → state, a linguistics-inspired framework for fine behavior decoding.
Naturalistic Behavioral Phenotyping
No maze required — capture place, speed, action sequences, and subtypes in the home cage.
4th–5th Paradigms
Data- and AI-Driven 3D Vision + AI-generated ethogram
Advancing Past the 3rd Paradigm
Against Noldus and ANY-maze
Beyond the Lab
Commercial deployment vs. research-stage MoSeq
100+ Users Worldwide
Research translated into real-world adoption
Only Production-Ready 3D AI Platform
A deployable platform for animal behavior research
Product Architecture
From multimodal sensing to digital phenotyping
Sensing · Edge Intelligence · Data Hub · Application
Sensing hardware, embedded algorithms, and centralized control software are integrated, enabling multimodal acquisition, real-time AI analysis, centralized device management, and visualization reporting.
Why NextCage
Ahead of traditional activity cages across key metrics
Category
Specific indicators
Traditional observation systemsPrimarily Single-Metric Monitoring
Our systemComprehensive multi-metric analysis
Animal welfare
Multi-Animal Monitoring
Only 1
Simultaneous monitoring of 2–5 animals with stable multi-ID and fine-behavior recognition
Undisturbed Home-Cage Monitoring
Reduces stress and preserves naturalistic behavior.
Enriched environment
Running wheels, climbing structures, and other enrichment modules.
Technology methods
3D-AI technology
Patented 3D AI technology
AI quantitative observation
Real-time intelligent recognition of 8+ behaviors, reducing human error
Data dimension
Multimodal data (behavior + physiology + environment)
Multi-dimensional coverage beyond single-metric limits
Behavior parameters
Basic behaviors
Comparable coverage of basic behaviors
Fine-grained behaviors (real-time)
Enables real-time recognition of fine-grained behaviors.
Video tracking
AI-driven high-precision tracking replacing manual observation
Physiological parameters
Drinking / Feeding
Drinking bouts & volume, feeding bouts & intake
Body temperature & weight
Temperature & weight monitoring, weight accuracy to 0.1 g
Environmental parameters
Smart Monitoring of Food, Water & Environmental Conditions
Real-time food, water, and env. parameters (temp, humidity, light) with automatic alerts for animal welfare and study continuity
Core capabilities
One system, complete phenotyping—from behavior to physiology
Real-time multi-animal 3D parsing
Synchronized pose and trajectory reconstruction quantifies fine-grained behavior and social interactions, making complex behavioral phenotypes computable and comparable.
24/7
Around-the-clock home-cage observation
Automated 24/7 operation for chronic models and longitudinal designs.
Diet
Smart food & water monitoring
Automatic feeding and drinking bout counts and intake with real-time anomaly alerts.
0.1 g
Automated temperature & weight
Contactless temperature trending with weight precision to 0.1 g.
FILTER BY CAPABILITY
Integrated multimodal sensing, edge AI, and visual reporting, covering fine behavior, 24/7 monitoring, and physiology.
System options
Hardware and software, configured for your study
From cage sensors to AI algorithms and visualization—deploy only the modules you need.
Hardware
Terminal hardware
- Multi-view cameras & identity markers
- Monitoring cages · MCU · edge compute
- IVC · lighting · IR thermometer
- Env. sensors (temp / humidity / light)
Software
Algorithms & software
- Multi-animal ID & behavior recognition
- Live monitoring · 3D reconstruction views
- Behavior sequences & synced charts
- Central server · OTA · high-throughput capture
Get started
Book a NextCage demo
Explore deployment options, custom configs, and research collaboration — start smart-cage phenotyping.