A Simplified Time-Domain Fitting Method Based on Fractional Operational Matrix for Cole Parameter Estimation

Abstract

The Cole model is widely used in bioimpedance spectroscopy (BIS) applications for evaluating the contents and status of biological tissues. Traditional frequency-domain fitting methods for Cole parameter estimation (CPE) often need wideband direct or indirect BIS measurements. The newly emerged time-domain fitting methods do not require BIS measurement, but they usually have unsatisfactory estimation accuracy and heavily rely on some specific excitations. This paper proposes a novel time-domain fitting method based on the fractional operational matrix (FOM) for CPE. First, the Cole model is represented as a FOM-based algebraic equation. Then, the model-based voltage response can be calculated as the product of the sampled current excitation and the FOM-based Cole equation. Finally, the Cole parameter can be estimated by minimizing the sum of squares error between the sampled voltage response and the model-based voltage response using an iterative nonlinear least-squares fitting algorithm. Experimental measurements are verified on three 2R1C circuits and in vivo leg muscle of a healthy volunteer. The results show that the Cole parameter can be accurately estimated by the proposed FOM-based fitting method directly using the sampled current and voltage signals. This paper establishes an effective time-domain fitting method for CPE, which could greatly simplify the hardware and software designs without the need for the BIS measurement.