Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
( 11, 18-25 ). Many explanations have been suggested for this
failure and several recommendations were published aiming to
improve the quality of both preclinical and clinical studies ( 18,
20 ). Among them, the main criticism relies on the animal model
used, its relevance to the problem studied and the fact that several
models should be used to prove the efficiency of a drug.
Based on the above, in this chapter, we focus on two animal
models of focal cerebral ischemia. There are different approaches
to induce a focal ischemic lesion. The models of permanent isch-
emia induced by electrocoagulation originally developed by Tamura
and colleagues ( 26 ) and the permanent or transient intraluminal
filament models initially developed by Longa and colleagues ( 27 )
are the most widely used. They were performed on different species
and were adapted or slightly modified since their first description.
Therefore, in the following sections we describe in detail the pro-
cedure to induce brain focal ischemia through proximal transient
occlusion of the MCA (middle cerebral artery) in the rat ( 27 )
(intraluminal filament model) and through permanent distal occlu-
sion of the MCA in the mouse ( 26 ) (electrocoagulation model).
2
Material
Animals need to be acclimated before any experiment (animals
should be kept in an appropriate animal facility at least 5 days prior
to the experiment).
The choice of the animal to be used in the experiment is of
primary importance. Indeed, it is well known that the response to
ischemia depends on several factors related to age (see Note 1) and
strain (see Note 2). Comorbidity factors (see Note 3) and gender
(see Note 4) may also influence the results. In the present example,
we use male Sprague-Dawley rats (weighing from 280 to 320 g).
2.1
Rats
Male mice, 25-30 g are acclimated to the animal house for at least 5
days before experiments. All animals are housed in a 12 h day-night
cycle (from 8 to 87) at a temperature of 22°C and humidity of 60%.
They have access to water and food (commercial pellets) at libitum.
For obvious reasons, animals need to be housed in individual
cages, at least at the acute phase after brain ischemia induction.
The evolution of animal's weight and its general status should be
monitored every day after surgery.
All the surgical procedure should be performed in aseptic con-
ditions using sterilized instrument and materials. During the surgi-
cal procedure, put surgical tools on a sterile place (usually on the
back of the surgical tool following its sterilization). If the surgical
tools have been put by error on a non-sterilized space, re-sterilize
it quickly using the bench sterilizer (few seconds).
2.2
Mice
Search WWH ::




Custom Search