Comparison of automated home-cage monitoring systems: Emphasis on feeding behaviour, activity and spatial learning following pharmacological interventions

• Published in: Journal of neuroscience methods Vol. 234; pp. 13 - 25
• Main Authors: Robinson, Lianne, Riedel, Gernot
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 30.08.2014
• Subjects: Animals; Apomorphine - pharmacology; Automatic Data Processing; Cholinergic Antagonists - pharmacology; Dopamine Agonists - pharmacology; Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; Excitatory Amino Acid Antagonists - pharmacology; Exploratory Behavior - drug effects; Exploratory Behavior - physiology; Feeding Behavior - drug effects; Feeding Behavior - physiology; Female; Food intake; History, 20th Century; Home cage; Locomotor activity; Male; Mice; Mice, Inbred C57BL; Mice, Inbred DBA; Monitoring, Physiologic - instrumentation; Monitoring, Physiologic - methods; Motor Activity - drug effects; Motor Activity - physiology; Phencyclidine - pharmacology; Piperidines - pharmacology; Pyrazoles - pharmacology; Scopolamine Hydrobromide - pharmacology; Spatial learning; Spatial Learning - drug effects; Spatial Learning - physiology; Mice; Food intake; Home cage; Locomotor activity; Spatial learning
• ISSN: 0165-0270; 1872-678X
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2014.06.013

•We compared three automated home cage monitoring systems.•We determined the effect of pharmacological intervention and strain on behaviours.•Drug induced changes in the behaviours were established with all three systems.•Differences between the sensitivity and utility of the systems were observed. Different automated systems have been developed to facilitate long-term and continuous assessment of behaviours including locomotor activity, feeding behaviour and circadian activity. This study assessed the effectiveness of three different observation systems as methods for determining strain and pharmacological induced differences in locomotor activity, feeding behaviour and spatial learning. The effect of the CB1 antagonist AM251 on feeding behaviour was determined in the PhenoMaster and PhenoTyper. Next, effects of cholinergic (scopolamine) and glutamatergic (Phenylcyclidine, PCP) receptor antagonism and dopaminergic agonism (apomorphine) on activity were assessed in the PhenoTyper and IntelliCage. Finally, the IntelliCage was utilised to determine differences in activity and spatial learning of C57BL/6 and DBA/2 mouse strains following pharmacological intervention. AM251 induced a suppression of food intake, feeding behaviour and a reduction in body weight in both the PhenoTyper and PhenoMaster. Apomorphine reduced activity in both the PhenoTyper and IntelliCage. Whereas, decreased activity was evident with PCP in the PhenoTyper, but not IntelliCage and Scopolamine induced a trend towards elevated levels of activity in the IntelliCage but not PhenoTyper. Strain differences in activity and spatial learning were also evident, with increased corner visits and drug induced impairments only observed with C57BL/6 mice. The automated home cage observation systems determined similar drug and strain effects on behaviour to those observed using traditional methods. All three observation systems reported drug-induced changes in behaviour however, they differ in their application of spatial learning tasks and utilisation of single versus group housed recordings.