Group housing: A robotic system to track and interact with individuals

描述(由申请人提供)：单独饲养动物，即使是很短的一段时间，也会对行为、学习能力和生理产生负面影响。群养啮齿动物通过改善行为和生理反应，能够更好地应对压力。不幸的是，由于技术限制，许多实验，包括那些旨在测量行为、昼夜活动和/或睡眠的实验，都需要单人住房。自动提供实验干预措施，例如轻轻轻推以干扰睡眠，在单个动物身上很容易完成，但在集体收容环境中则很复杂。这项申请的总体目标是(1)开发一种新型的笼舍，旨在利用长期的计算机辅助视频监控和射频识别(RFID)来正确和准确地识别和跟踪三个或更多组中的单个动物，并且(2)自动对组内的一个或多个动物施加干预刺激，该笼舍设计用于多个物理上相似的动物的群居。该系统将采用位于笼子正上方的机械臂，当与视频跟踪模块和RFID读取器捆绑在一起时，可以根据特定状态的反馈对特定动物选择性地施加干预刺激(即，轻轻轻推睡眠不足)。可以使用经由视频跟踪、无线脑电图仪(EEG)测量、特定神经化学物质的无线生物传感器测量或其他无线生理测量收集的数据来对定义的状态进行分类。该系统将是可配置的，以便干预刺激可以基于研究人员定义的生理参数应用于单个动物。在这项应用的第一阶段，我们将设计并测试一个原型围栏，用于在一小群老鼠身上识别和刺激个体动物。第二阶段将通过测试和改进涉及多只大鼠和小鼠的动物跟踪和行为，提高视频跟踪的准确性，并增加研究人员可用的干预刺激类型，来继续这一发展。在第二阶段完成后，我们将拥有一个完整的、交钥匙的硬件和软件解决方案，并将在商业上向研究界提供。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Individually housing animals, even for a short period, is known to have a negative influence on behavior, learning ability, and physiology. Group-housed rodents are better able to cope with stress through improved behavioral and physiological responses. Unfortunately, many experiments, including those designed to measure behavior, circadian activity, and/or sleep, necessitate single-housing due to technological restrictions. Automated delivery of an experimental intervention, such as gentle nudging to disturb sleep, is easily accomplished with single animals but is complicated in group-housing environments. The overall goal of this application is (1) to develop a novel cage enclosure designed for group housing of multiple, physically similar animals with long-term computer-aided video monitoring and radio frequency identification (RFID) to correctly and accurately identify and track individual animals within a group of three or more and (2) to automatically apply an intervention stimulus to one or more animals within the group. This system will employ a robotic arm situated directly above the cage, which, when tied to the video tracking module and RFID reader, can selectively apply an intervention stimulus (i.e., gentle nudging for sleep deprivation) to a specific animal based on state-specific feedback. The defined state may be classified using data collected via video tracking, wireless electroencephalograph (EEG) measurement, wireless biosensor measurement of specific neurochemicals, or other wireless physiological measurements. The system will be configurable so that the intervention stimulus may be applied to an individual animal based on physiological parameters defined by the researcher. In Phase I of this application, we will design and test a prototype enclosure for individual animal identification and stimulus in a small group of rats. Phase II will continue this development by testing and refining animal tracking and behavior involving multiple rats and mice, increasing the accuracy of video tracking, and increasing the types of intervention stimuli available to the researcher. At the completion of Phase II, we will have a complete, turn-key hardware and software solution that will be commercially available to the research community.