Automated assessment of conditioning parameters for context and cued fear in mice
Automated assessment of conditioning parameters for context and cued fear in mice
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DOI：
10.1101/lm.43002
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发表时间：
2002-03-01
影响因子：
2
通讯作者：
Gold, LH
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Contarino, A;Baca, L;Gold, LH
常用于评估大鼠和小鼠的认知表现的行为技术是恐惧条件反射范式。在条件性恐惧实验中，啮齿动物暴露于先前配对的厌恶体验的环境刺激后所显示的冻结反应提供了动物的联想能力的行为指数。本研究考察了计算机控制的自动化冷冻监测系统记录小鼠不动行为的能力。还评估了自动化程序检测由各种训练方案的应用引起的组差异的灵敏度。统计分析显示，不动性评分与自动化设备和手工评分的数据收集的连续或时间采样方法之间的显着正相关。由计算机系统记录的行为模式非常相似，通过手工评分方法获得的。特别是，在上下文测试期间，暴露于先前与轻度足部电击（非条件刺激[US]）配对的环境刺激，与先前仅限于相同上下文刺激而未接受US的小鼠所显示的不动水平相比，在US条件化的小鼠中诱发增加的不动行为。此外，尽管在条件刺激（CS）测试中，先前暴露于US的小鼠在受到与US配对的环境线索大不相同的环境线索时表现出高水平的不动性，（情境恐惧泛化），手工评分和自动评分结果均显示了CS-US配对的效果（增加不动性）仅在训练将两种刺激相关联的小鼠中（配对组），但在暴露于CS和US的小鼠中（间隔40秒），（未配对组）或仅接受US（美国组）在条件反射期间，总体而言，结果示出了在自动化装置中测量的关联调节，并且突出了获得等待时间以及射束中断参数的效用。
A behavioral technique often used to evaluate the cognitive performance of rats and mice is the fear conditioning paradigm. During conditioned fear experiments, freezing responses shown by rodents after exposure to environmental stimuli previously paired to an aversive experience provide a behavioral index of the animal's associative abilities. The present study examined the ability of a computer-controlled automated Freeze Monitor system for recording immobility behavior in mice. The sensitivity of the automated procedure to detect group differences caused by the application of various training protocols was also evaluated. Statistical analyses revealed significant positive correlations between immobility scores obtained with the automated apparatus and hand-scored data collected by a continuous or a time-sampling method. Behavioral patterns recorded by the computerized system were very similar to those obtained by the hand-scoring methods adopted. In particular, during context testing, exposure to environmental stimuli previously paired with a mild foot shock (unconditioned stimulus [US]) evoked increased immobility behavior in mice conditioned with the US compared with levels of immobility displayed by mice previously confined to the same contextual stimuli without receiving the US. Moreover, although during conditioned stimulus (CS) testing, mice previously exposed to the US displayed high levels of immobility when confined to environmental cues much different from those paired with the US (contextual fear generalization), both hand-scored and automated results revealed the effect of CS-US pairing (increased immobility) only in mice trained to associate the two stimuli (paired group) but not in mice exposed to both CS and US separated by a 40-sec time interval (unpaired group) or in mice receiving only the US (US group) during conditioning sessions, Overall, the results show associative conditioning measured in an automated apparatus and highlight the utility of obtaining both latency as well as beam interruption parameters.