Rodent Behavioral Assessment in the Home Cage Using the SmartCage System - Animal Models of Acute Neurological Injuries: Injury and Mechanistic Assessments - page 210

produces an anxiolytic effect. This effect is consistent with the
results obtained using conventional elevated plus T-maze or Zero
maze (data not shown). Manual scoring validated the CageScore™
software calculations (Fig. 7b-d ).
In conclusion, the SmartCage™ system can automatically
quantify two fundamental rodent behavioral states of wake, and
sleep/inactive. In addition, with the aid of special modular devices,
the SmartCage™I system can also quantify other special behaviors
such as muscle coordination, balance, and anxiety-like behavior.
This integrated system is a powerful tool for the quantitative char-
acterization of fundamental behavioral elements and patterns in
the freely behaving mouse or rat in its home cage.
4. Behavioral
Procedure Note
General points : All behavioral tests can be performed on young,
adult, or aged rodents. However, the fi rst behavioral characteriza-
tion should be performed with adult male subjects 10-12 weeks
old. In our experiments male mice, 10-12 weeks old ( n = 8-10/
group), were used. Prior to spontaneous activity monitoring using
SmartCage™ system, animals were group-housed. For those stud-
ies on transgenic mice, the wild-type and homozygous mutant
mice were not segregated and were housed together. For targets
where adult male knockout mice cannot be obtained (i.e., early
lethality), heterozygous males of the same age can be substituted
depending on the study.
Usually, background white noise (approximately 50 dB) should
be present throughout testing, as was used in our preliminary
experiments with the system. If the SmartCage™ system or other
behavioral apparatuses are not set up at the animal facility, rodents
(particularly mice) should be allowed to habituate to the behavior
room environment for 30 min prior to experimentation unless oth-
erwise indicated. The SmartCage™ platform can be periodically
sanitized with a 0.25% bleach solution before each test, as needed.
At the end of each experiment, animals can be kept in their home
cages or transferred to fresh cages. The experimenters should change
gloves before handling mice from different cages. Although the
neurobehavioral assessments are automated using the SmartCage™,
the experimenter should be blind to the experimental treatments.
Care of behavioral instrument and devices : In general, the
SmartCage™ components like many other commercially available
apparatuses are highly durable and virtually “maintenance-free.”
However, care is needed to make sure no large dust particles (e.g.,
bedding litter) stick on the wall or directly block any IR sensor.
The fl oor-sensor can be washed with routine laboratory detergent
solutions (e.g., 0.25-0.5% bleach) with care not to scratch the