Solovieva A.S., Aronov D.A., Shubernetskaya O.S., Kalinin M.A., Moiseeva Е.V. Express-modification of cylinder test for assessing the behavioral parameters of young and old cbrb and BALB/CJ mice. Laboratory Animals for Science. 2021; 2. https://doi.org/10.29296/2618723X-2021-02-08
The standard cylinder test is used to reveal the behavioral patterns in rodent models of neurological diseases; in particular, it is widely used to reveal rodent motor asymmetry associated with manifestations of parkinsonism. Apparently, the lack of informative parameters measured in the standard modifications of this test limits its use in gerontology. We modified the test to shorten the observation time and expand the range of measured parameters, including exploratory activity. The purpose of the study was to analyze spontaneous behavior of young and old females of the original CBRB inbred strain with signs of parkinsonism after 80 weeks of age and females of the standard BALB/cJ strain of the same ages using express-test. Within 30 seconds, 15 different patterns of spontaneous behavior of the animal were assessed in the horizontal (left-right and forward-backward body movement) and vertical (rears with or without support, grooming) directions, including immobility of the body with head lifting or left-right moving and with complete akinesia, etc. Exploratory activity was assessed as the frequency of hole examination. Based on the data obtained, strain differences and age-related changes in the spontaneous behavior of female mice of the CBRB and BALB/cJ strains were revealed. For females of both strains, an age-related decrease in the number of rears with the support was found. In aged CBRB females, the number of rears without support and the activity of horizontal activities decreased, and the number of episodes of resting, grooming, and left-right head turns increased. The proposed set of activities measured in the express-test demonstrated the hidden capabilities of the well-known behavioral test and expanded the scope of its application to gerontology and pharmacology. The express modification of the cylinder test enabled to confirm not only the previously discovered motor traits of female CBRB mice, but also certain non-motor changes in spontaneous behavior that are similar to characteristics of patients with Parkinson's disease. This confirms the use of CBRB mice as an adequate model of parkinsonism.
Autors’ contributions
Solovieva A.S.– performing behavioral tests; conducting statistical processing of the obtained results; collecting, analyzing, and interpreting the results; writing the text of the article (Russian); responsibility for all aspects of the work related to the reliability of the data.
Aronov D.A. – breeding mice and maintaining the collection; participating in the statistical processing of the results; writing the text of the article (English); correction of the text of the article.
Shubernetskaya O.S. – participation in the performance of behavioral tests; critical remarks and participation in the correction of the text of the article.
Kalinin M.A. – participation in the performance of behavioral tests, in the maintenance of the collection, and experimental mice.
Moiseeva E.V. – development of the design of experiments and general conception of the article; analysis and interpretation of the results; correction of the text of the article; approval of the final version of the article for publication; responsibility for all aspects of the work related to the reliability of the data.
The study was performed without external funding
The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest