Abstract
Background:
In recent years, the proliferation of mobile applications in the health and fitness sector has been rapid. Despite the enhanced accessibility of these systems, concerns regarding their validation persist, and their accuracy remains to be thoroughly evaluated compared to conventional motion analysis methodologies. Furthermore, there is a paucity of evidence regarding real-time feedback and movement quality assessment. Consequently, this systematic review aims to evaluate the current state of camera-based mobile applications for movement screening in healthy adults, focusing on specific types of movement.
Methods:
A systematic literature search was conducted in four databases—PubMed, ScienceDirect, Web of Science, and IEEE Xplore—covering the period from 2000 to 2024. The search strategy was based on key terms related to four main concepts: screening, mobile applications, cameras, and physical activity. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines were followed. The study was registered a priori on PROSPERO (Registration ID: CRD42023444355) to ensure transparency and prevent selective reporting of outcomes.
Results:
Of the 2,716 records initially identified, eight studies met the specified inclusion criteria. The studies were primarily concerned with fitness exercises, gait analysis, and sport-specific movements. Some studies demonstrated high reliability compared to gold standard systems, while others reported technical limitations such as camera positioning and data interpretation issues. Feedback mechanisms varied, with many applications lacking personalized real-time correction.
Conclusion:
Despite the potential of smartphone-based movement screening applications, particularly their accessibility and affordability, challenges remain regarding accuracy and user feedback. Precise measurements comparable to established methods are crucial for application-oriented camera-based movement screening. Equally important are improving real-time feedback, expanding the types of movement that can be assessed, and ensuring broad applicability across different populations and environments to ensure sustainable use of application-based movement screening.
1 Introduction
The presence of mobile applications, including those pertaining to the sports/fitness/health market, has accelerated markedly in recent years (). The most popular mobile application marketplaces offer users millions of applications (Google Play Store: 2.3 million apps; Apple App Store: approximately 2 million) (). By 2024, more than 200,000 health and fitness applications had become available across various app stores worldwide (). These applications address a comprehensive range of user needs, encompassing general fitness and wellness and more specific areas such as medical management and health behavior changes (). Most users, 517 million, opt for free fitness applications, while a smaller number, 384 million, choose paid applications (). Fitness and Exercise applications that provide support and guidance for fitness workouts and incorporate gamification elements are highly popular due to their ability to be used on demand, aligning with the current market for flexibility (, ).
Despite the growing prevalence of medical and exercise applications, there is a paucity of studies that assess the accuracy and efficacy of camera-based mobile applications used for movement assessment and exercise guidance, and their findings are subsequently published in peer-reviewed journals. A few of these studies have been summarized in previous systematic reviews. For example, Thompson et al. () investigated mobile applications to support therapeutic exercises targeting muscle pain and demonstrated that such applications may effectively reduce pain levels. In a similar therapeutic context, Pfeifer et al. () analyzed the effectiveness of mobile interventions in patients with chronic pain and concluded that these interventions can be beneficial in reducing pain. Nussbaum et al. () conducted a systematic review of mobile health applications in rehabilitation and found that these applications demonstrated good psychometric properties when measuring specific physical activity or gait parameters. Furthermore, when used as interventions, they positively affected various medical and functional outcomes. While these reviews provide important insights into therapeutic use cases, few have systematically examined the diagnostic validity of movement-focused applications under gold-standard conditions. Other reviews, such as those by Moreira et al. () and Milani et al. (), examined mobile applications for postural assessment. However, they primarily addressed static analysis and did not consider the dynamic aspects of human movement, which are central to the scope of our review. Among the existing reviews on the use of mobile applications in the context of human movement, the work by Silva et al. () is notable for its focus on the validity and reliability of applications designed to assess force, power, speed, and change of direction. However, their review considers mobile applications more broadly without distinguishing smartphone-based applications specifically. Moreover, their study does not address the potential role of feedback provided by these applications, an aspect that represents a crucial gap in the current literature.
In the absence of robust validation, users may receive ineffective or even detrimental recommendations, particularly when engaging in unsupervised physical activity (see the discussion of harmful applications by (). Those applications typically lack a crucial feature: the ability to correct user movements during exercise (). Incorrect movements can cause pain and injury, discouraging physical activity and leading to further deterioration of health conditions. Fitness applications that analyze movement and tailor recommendations can help prevent this vicious cycle. When adequately validated, such applications could offer substantial benefits, especially in contexts lacking professional supervision.
Most highly validated movement analysis systems are characterized by high time demands, significant costs, and limited accessibility, typically confined to clinical or research settings (). Consequently, these systems are not accessible to the typical consumer. The current gold standard for human motion analysis are optical 3D motion capture systems, which employ multiple cameras and markers on the moving body. Emerging technologies, such as markerless systems utilizing devices such as the Kinect, have been developed as more affordable alternatives, particularly in the domains of physical therapy and rehabilitation [(); see also ()]. Similarly, advances in smartphone technology have created opportunities for movement screening and analysis via mobile devices, offering greater accessibility, convenience, and the potential for direct, real-time feedback. However, there is a paucity of mobile applications with camera-based movement screening, where a person's movements are captured via a mobile device and analyzed in real-time. Furthermore, these applications are poorly represented, validated, and rarely peer-reviewed or presented in scientific journals. Thus, our aim is (1) to identify current camera-based mobile applications, (2) to examine which movement skills are addressed and whether these tools provide immediate feedback to the user regarding movement quality, and (3) to highlight areas for further improvement and validation, with a particular focus on enhancing measurement accuracy and usability—factors for the effective everyday use of camera-based movement analysis systems.
We provide an overview of the various applications and the movement skills under investigation. While reviews already exist that focus on rehabilitation, the scope of this work is on applications for healthy individuals without motor and/or cognitive limitations. From a movement science perspective, the technical implementation and the underlying algorithms for motion analysis are not the primary focus. This review focuses on camera-based movement analysis applications that deliver immediate results without post-processing and are compatible with standard mobile devices such as smartphones or tablets. By presenting an evidence-based overview of apps validated in scientific studies, the review offers practical value. It helps distinguish between tools supported by empirical data and those still in early development, guiding practitioners and researchers toward reliable and accurate solutions for practical use.
2 Methods
2.1 Protocol and registration
This systematic review was conducted in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses [PRISMA, Page et al. ()]. It was registered a priori with PROSPERO (Registration ID: CRD42023444355) to ensure transparency and prevent selective reporting of outcomes.
2.2 Eligibility criteria
The study focused on the availability of full-length articles. We considered original research articles published in peer-reviewed journals and conference papers in English or German between 2000 and 2024. The participants targeted in the included studies were adults aged 18 years or older. All participants were required to be healthy and to have no motor-cognitive disabilities or other disorders/disabilities to exclude studies focusing on rehabilitation contexts. A mandatory inclusion criterion was the utilization of a movement screening methodology through camera-based mobile applications, with the supplementary requirement that the live and real-time movement analysis constituted an intrinsic component of the application rather than merely recording the movement for subsequent examination through disparate software.
2.3 Literature search
A comprehensive search was conducted using the following databases: PubMed, Science Direct, Web of Science, and IEEE Xplore. The search was conducted on September 28, 2023, and updated on February 22, 2024. Studies published from the year 2000 onwards were included in the search. The search strategy consisted of key terms (MeSH terms in PubMed) relevant to four key concepts: screening, mobile application, camera, and physical activity. The entire electronic search strings across the various databases is presented in Table 1.
Table 1
| Database | String |
|---|---|
| Pubmed | (assessment OR screening OR diagnos* OR examination) AND (mobile* OR “mobile application*” OR “mobile phone” OR “mobile device*” OR “mobile health” OR “mobile technolog*” OR smartphone OR “cell phone” OR digital* OR “digital technolog*” OR “digital health application*” OR Tablet OR ehealth OR mhealth) AND (camera* OR video*) AND (movement OR “physical activity” OR exercise OR training OR fitness OR “physical fitness”) NOT (disease OR disorder) |
| ScienceDirect | (assessment OR screening) AND (“mobile application” OR mhealth) AND (camera) AND (movement OR “physical activity” OR exercise) NOT (disease) |
| Web of Science | (assessment OR screening OR diagnos* OR examination) AND (mobile* OR “mobile application*” OR “mobile phone” OR “mobile device*” OR “mobile health” OR “mobile technolog*” OR smartphone OR “cell phone” OR digital* OR “digital technolog*” OR “digital health application*” OR Tablet OR ehealth OR mhealth) AND (camera* OR video*) AND (movement OR “physical activity” OR exercise OR training OR fitness OR “physical fitness”) NOT (disease OR disorder) |
| IEEE Xplore | (assessment OR screening OR diagnos* OR examination) AND (mobile* OR “mobile application*” OR “mobile phone” OR “mobile device*” OR “mobile health” OR “mobile technolog*” OR smartphone OR “cell phone” OR digital* OR “digital technolog*” OR “digital health application*” OR Tablet OR ehealth OR mhealth) AND (camera* OR video*) AND (movement OR “physical activity” OR exercise OR training OR fitness OR “physical fitness”) NOT (disease OR disorder) |
Overview of database-specific search strategies and search strings.
Note: We specifically included the term “diagnosis” in the search strategy to broaden the scope of the search and to ensure that potentially relevant studies that did not have direct diagnostic applications but could still be relevant to the topic of the investigation were included.
2.4 Identification and selection of studies
The studies identified from the various databases were recorded, and their metadata was exported to a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. The dataset comprises a variety of fundamentals, including author(s) name(s), year, journal name, title, and so forth. Duplicates were removed. Two of the three reviewers (IE-R and HK) evaluated each title and abstract for potential eligibility using pre-established criteria based on the eligibility criteria described above. If an article was initially deemed suitable for inclusion, the full text of the remaining paper was assessed. Authors of articles were contacted via email if the full-text manuscript was unavailable. All three reviewers independently screened each full-text article against the eligibility criteria (IE-R, TK, and HK). Any conflicts during screening were resolved through discussion between the three reviewers. The included studies can be found in Table 2.
Table 2
| First author(s), year; country | Study aim | Sample (n; population; age) | Technical implementation (software/hardware) | Movement skill | Type of feedback/coaching | Reference standard | Main outcome |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fanton and Harari (2022) (); USA | Validation of a functional movement assessment | n = 150; age = 18–85 years; ♂ = 56 ♀ = 94 | Software: Halo Movement App (HMA) Hardware: Smartphone (not further specified) | Single leg stance, forward lunges, overhead squat, overhead reach, feet together squat | Score 0–100 (100 = best) based on computer vision algorithms applying deep neural networks; no feedback to users on the quality of movement performance |
| Moderate to strong correlations between HMA overall score, sensor-based 3D motion capture metrics, and scores from 13 standardized functional movement tests Ability to differentiate regular healthy individuals from professional athletes and impaired participants |
| Tran (2020) (); USA | Developing an application to track and calculate 3D lower-body gait in real-time | n.a./case study | Software: LGait—Apple ARKit-3 (Lower-Body Motion Tracking version 1.0.1) Hardware: iPhone 11, iPad mini 5, and iPad Pro | Gait | Measurement of joint angles, but no feedback on the quality of the gait or information on possible improvements | Vicon Motion System | Angle values are compatible (differences in the angles between the two systems are about 2◦), but the LGait application slightly delays tracking the gait cycle |
| Pham (2022) (); Vietnam | Developing an automated system to recognize and evaluate physical exercises | n = 9 (5 for training, 4 for testing); age = 15–55 years | Software: Google MediaPipe Hardware: Smartphone (not further specified) | Arm circles, squats, and standing crossover toe touches | Depending on the deviation of individual joint movements, a score is calculated that gives the user feedback on what should be improved | n.a. | Average accuracy of 98.33% in recognizing movement skills |
| Aoyagi (2022) (); Japan | Developing an application that enables markerless 3D motion capture | n = 90 original humanoid computer graphics (CG) characters created (VRM format) | Software: Three-Dimensional Pose Tracker for Gait Test (TDPT-GT) Hardware: iPhone 12 and iPhone SE2 | Gait | so far, no feedback for users | Vicon Motion System | Application reconstructs the 3D full-body human motion efficiently in real time |
| Fernandez (2023) (); New Zealand/Philippines | Validation of a computer-vision-based application with lab-based systems to quantify calf raise outcomes | n = 13 ♂ = 6; age = 38 (10) years ♀ = 7; age = 34 (7) years | Software: Calf Raise App (CRapp) Hardware: Two iPad Air 2 devices (Apple, iOS 14.1) | Calf raises | Videos for raters, but no feedback on performance for users | -3D Motion Capture System -Force Plate | Good to excellent validity across measures and excellent intra- and inter-rater reliability |
| Stanton (2017) (); Australia | Examine the concurrent validity and intra-rater reliability of the MyJump app compared to laboratory-based measurements | n = 29; age = 26.41 (5.36) years ♂ = 10 ♀ = 19 | Software: MyJump App Hardware: iPhone 6s | Counter Movement Jump (CMJ) and Drop Jump (DJ) | Provides jump height based on flight time; no feedback on quality of movement execution | Force plate | MyJump is valid and highly reliable for CMJ and DJ performance measurement and has a strong correlation for CMJ and DJ with force plate data |
| Jeon (2021) (); Korea | Optimization of 2D human pose estimation for mobile devices with real-time feedback | n = 23; age not specified | Software: TensorFlow Hardware: Samsung S10, Samsung Note9, Google Pixel 3, iPhone 11 | Chest-stretch, squat shoulder press, tuck jump, side-bend knee-up, and barbell power clean | Feedback on deviations in real-time based on an action database | COCO dataset (Common Objects in Context) | Average precision of 65.2% (COCO), 89.6% (Fitness dataset) and consistent detection of joint coordinates, 97.39% accuracy in movement counting |
| Li (2021) (); Taiwan | Developing a system for the analysis of baseball swings and distinguishing good from bad swings | n = 10; age not specified ♂ = 10 | Software: Open Pose Hardware: Smartphone (not further specified) | Baseball swing | Overall score from 0 to 100, based on custom rules | Baseball swing distance | The system's score positively correlates with hit distance, indicating its accuracy in distinguishing good and poor swings |
Overview of included studies on camera-based mobile applications for movement screening.
Abbreviations: n.a., not applicable.
2.5 Data extraction
The following key data were extracted from each study: first author(s), year, country, study aims, sample characteristics (e.g., age, gender, health status), movement screening methods, quality criteria, outcome measures, and limitations. Three independent reviewers extracted the data to minimize errors and bias. Any discrepancies were resolved through discussion. The extracted data were then compiled into a summary table, which formed the basis for the descriptive analysis and synthesis of results.
2.6 Study risk of bias assessment
The studies included in this review are highly heterogeneous in content and research design, which limits the applicability of standard quality assessment tools and complicates direct comparison. Existing instruments, such as the JBI Critical Appraisal Tools, did not match the methodological characteristics of the included studies. Specifically, the checklists designed for diagnostic accuracy and analytical cross-sectional studies were inappropriate for this review. Furthermore, a search within the EQUATOR Network for alternative checklists did not yield any tools that would provide meaningful added value for assessing study quality from a movement science perspective. To maintain focus on the primary objectives of this systematic review, we chose not to conduct a formal quality assessment using conventional appraisal tools. The aim of this review is not to evaluate the methodological rigor or the effectiveness of interventions. As a result, a formal risk of bias assessment was not conducted.
3 Results
3.1 Study selection
In the initial search, 2,718 entries were identified across the following databases: PubMed (107), Science Direct (424), Web of Science (1,881), and IEEE Xplore (304). Two additional entries were identified through the reference list of a review paper (). Subsequently, 301 entries were identified as duplicates and removed. The remaining 2,417 records were assessed based on their title and abstract, excluding 2,369 studies that did not meet the pre-established inclusion criteria. Following this initial screening, 48 full-text reports were selected for further evaluation. In the subsequent detailed assessment, 40 reports were excluded for various reasons. Some studies were not based on smartphone or video technologies, while others focused on screening methods that were applied retrospectively. Additionally, studies employing marker-based tracking and those lacking video recording were excluded. One study was excluded because it focused on children or adolescents, and another was excluded because it was used exclusively in a clinical setting (see Figure 1). Following this review process, eight studies were included in the final analysis of this systematic review.
Figure 1
3.2 Characteristics of studies
The studies were conducted in various countries, including the USA (n = 2), Vietnam, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, New Zealand, and Australia. They were conducted between 2017 and 2023, although the inclusion criteria allowed for studies published since 2000. This suggests that research in this area has gained momentum only in recent years.
The included studies aimed to validate mobile applications for tracking and assessing specific movement patterns such as jumps (
The populations under investigation exhibited considerable diversity, although they often comprised relatively limited sample sizes. For example, Fanton and Harari et al. (
Smartphone-based applications employing sophisticated technologies such as Apple ARKit-3 (
The included studies examined fundamental movement patterns or sport-specific exercises intending to assess various aspects of physical performance. Fanton and Harari et al. (
The type of feedback also exhibited considerable variability across the studies. In the Halo Movement application by Fanton and Harari et al. (
The remaining studies included in this review (
The results of the reference standards exhibit considerable variation across the included studies. The employment of reference standards serves the objective of evaluating the efficacy of motion analysis in mobile systems. Fanton and Harari et al. (
Two research groups have compared their gait analysis applications with the Vicon Motion System (
Two studies utilized the force plate as a reference standard (
Two studies did not use any traditional reference system. The experiment by Li et al. (
The study results indicate that smartphone-based applications can potentially serve as a promising and practical tool for movement screening. The validity and reliability of these applications have been demonstrated to be comparable to that of established reference standards, such as motion capture systems and force plates. This comparison has mainly focused on assessing fundamental fitness exercises, gait, and sport-specific movements. However, the study populations varied in age, physical ability, and size, and many samples were relatively small, which may limit generalizability. Furthermore, although quantitative feedback is frequently offered, personalized and qualitative feedback concerning movement execution remains deficient in most applications, underscoring a pivotal domain for future development.
3.3 Limitations of the included studies
A range of limitations in different categories were examined in the studies. As evidenced by studies such as those conducted by Aoyagi et al. (
Technical limitations include difficulties in capturing small joint segments (
A comprehensive review of the extant literature reveals significant shortcomings in the studies reviewed. These shortcomings pertain to the validity and generalizability of the studies, the technical requirements of the studies, and the movement analysis in the studies. The shortcomings highlight the necessity for more robust validation, enhanced adaptability to diverse user groups, and improvements in system functionality. These improvements are crucial to ensure more accurate and comprehensive performance assessments, especially regarding feedback.
3.4 Risk of bias assessment
The studies demonstrate a substantial degree of variation in the level of detail provided regarding the recruitment of participants. The studies conducted by Fernandez et al. (
Most studies ensured that all participants were included in the analysis, contributing to reliable results by minimizing the potential for bias from excluding specific individuals. In contrast, Fernandez et al. (
The studies utilized varied reference standards, demonstrating varying degrees of methodological rigor. Several studies employed well-established methodologies for motion analysis, including the Vicon Motion System (
The discrepancies in study design, participant recruitment, and the utilization of reference standards across these studies underscore the inconsistencies in study quality that impact the results’ internal validity, reliability, and generalizability.
3.5 Usability and motivation in camera-based movement screening apps
A key factor for the long-term acceptance and effectiveness of camera-based movement analysis applications is their usability. This includes not only intuitive navigation and ease of use but also the clarity of feedback and comprehensibility of exercise instructions. Studies such as that by Jeon et al. (
4 Discussion
The rapid expansion of mobile applications within the health and fitness industry has facilitated enhanced access to health monitoring tools (
4.1 Comparison with established methods and technological challenges
Optical 3D motion capture systems are regarded as the gold standard in motion analysis and are renowned for their precision. Nevertheless, these systems' high cost and complexity have primarily restricted their use to clinical and research settings, severely limiting access to the general population (
4.2 Pose estimation frameworks and movement-specific reference standards
The reviewed applications employ a variety of pose estimation frameworks, each of which affects both the functional scope and the validity of movement assessment. OpenPose, as used by Li et al. (
Importantly, due to the diversity of movements assessed, different reference standards were applied across studies—further limiting comparability. For instance, force plates were used as the reference standard in counter-movement jump analyses (
4.3 Feedback
Absent direct feedback, users cannot ascertain the accuracy of a movement recorded on a smartphone. It is also crucial to differentiate between the various forms of feedback (
Pham et al. (
4.4 Population
Except for Fanton and Harari et al. (
5 Limitations
In addition to the constraints inherent to the studies included in this review, this analysis is also subject to certain limitations. As delineated in the present analysis, incorporating an additional search term, such as “direct feedback” or “user experience,” could have been a valuable addition during the review process of the articles. However, this may have resulted in an even lower number of hits. A further limitation of this review is the exclusion of studies dealing with children and adolescents. This exclusion may have reduced the number of studies identified, and more applications could have been analyzed. This exclusion may have reduced the number of studies identified, and more applications could have been analyzed. Additionally, the absence of a quality assessment checklist poses another limitation, as no suitable checklist was available. Developing customized quality assessment instruments that address the particular requirements of interdisciplinary studies in movement science would be advantageous for future systematic reviews. In order to facilitate more consistent evaluation and comparability across studies, it is imperative that these tools consider diverse study designs and technical criteria, including but not limited to sensor accuracy, real-time feedback, and usability. Also, an important aspect of this review is its focus on applications that have been examined in peer-reviewed studies. As a result, not all potentially relevant applications currently available on the market were included. The absence of certain applications does not necessarily reflect low quality, but rather a lack of published evidence. This highlights the need for future research to expand and empirically evaluate newer, widely used applications in order to assess their effectiveness, accuracy, and usability
6 Conclusions
Despite the growing potential of camera-based smartphone applications for movement analysis in healthy adults, this systematic review reveals that their scientific validation remains limited and heterogeneous. While some studies demonstrated methodological transparency and high scientific rigor, others exhibited notable weaknesses that compromise the reliability of their findings. Of the eight included applications, only three – MyJump, Halo Movement, and the system developed by Jeon et al. (
7 Future research
Future research is required to enhance the accuracy and versatility of smartphone-based screening applications in various everyday settings for diverse population groups and a range of movements. Evaluating the agreement between new measurement tools and established gold standards using appropriate methodologies, such as Bland-Altman analysis, is essential since correlation alone is insufficient for establishing equivalence (
Statements
Author contributions
IE-R: Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft. TK: Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft. HK: Data curation, Investigation, Methodology, Validation, Visualization, Writing – original draft. NS: Conceptualization, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Project administration, Supervision, Writing – review & editing.
Funding
The author(s) declare that financial support was received for the research and/or publication of this article. VDI/VDE Innovation+Technik GmbH Project Management Agency “Invest BW” Funding code: BW1_1358/02.
Conflict of interest
The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.
Generative AI statement
The author(s) declare that no Generative AI was used in the creation of this manuscript.
Publisher’s note
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.
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Summary
Keywords
exercise, motion analysis, mhealth, ehealth, health-related, mobile application
Citation
El-Rajab I, Klotzbier TJ, Korbus H and Schott N (2025) Camera-based mobile applications for movement screening in healthy adults: a systematic review. Front. Sports Act. Living 7:1531050. doi: 10.3389/fspor.2025.1531050
Received
19 November 2024
Accepted
25 April 2025
Published
09 May 2025
Volume
7 - 2025
Edited by
Pietro Picerno, University of Sassari, Italy
Reviewed by
Tiago Jeronimo Dos Santos, University of Almeria, Spain
Peter Wolf, ETH Zürich, Switzerland
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Copyright
© 2025 El-Rajab, Klotzbier, Korbus and Schott.
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) and the copyright owner(s) 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: Inaam El-Rajab inaam.el-rajab@inspo.uni-stuttgart.de
† These authors have contributed equally to this work
Disclaimer
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