This study presents an innovative running wheel-based animal mobility system to quantify an effective exercise activity in rats. A rat-friendly testbed is built, using a predefined adaptive acceleration curve, and a high correlation between the effective exercise rate and the infarct volume suggests the protocol's potential for stroke prevention experiments.
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Method Article
An Innovative Running Wheel-based Mechanism for Improved Rat Training Performance
In This Article
Summary
Abstract
This study presents an animal mobility system, equipped with a positioning running wheel (PRW), as a way to quantify the efficacy of an exercise activity for reducing the severity of the effects of the stroke in rats. This system provides more effective animal exercise training than commercially available systems such as treadmills and motorized running wheels (MRWs). In contrast to an MRW that can only achieve speeds below 20 m/min, rats are permitted to run at a stable speed of 30 m/min on a more spacious and high-density rubber running track supported by a 15 cm wide acrylic wheel with a diameter of 55 cm in this work. Using a predefined adaptive acceleration curve, the system not only reduces the operator error but also trains the rats to run persistently until a specified intensity is reached. As a way to evaluate the exercise effectiveness, real-time position of a rat is detected by four pairs of infrared sensors deployed on the running wheel. Once an adaptive acceleration curve is initiated using a microcontroller, the data obtained by the infrared sensors are automatically recorded and analyzed in a computer. For comparison purposes, 3 week training is conducted on rats using a treadmill, an MRW and a PRW. After surgically inducing middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAo), modified neurological severity scores (mNSS) and an inclined plane test were conducted to assess the neurological damages to the rats. PRW is experimentally validated as the most effective among such animal mobility systems. Furthermore, an exercise effectiveness measure, based on rat position analysis, showed that there is a high negative correlation between the effective exercise and the infarct volume, and can be employed to quantify a rat training in any type of brain damage reduction experiments.
Introduction
Strokes exist continuously as a financial burden to countries globally, leaving countless patients physically and mentally disabled1,2. There is clinical evidence to suggest that regular exercise can improve nerve regeneration and strengthen neural connections3,4, and it is also shown that exercise can decrease the risk of suffering ischemic strokes5. With either a treadmill or a running wheel as an exercise training system, rodents, such as rats, serve as a proxy for humans for testing the effectiveness of exercises in a vast majority of clinical experiments6-8
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Protocol
Ethics Statement: The experimental procedures were approved by the animal ethics committee of Southern Taiwan University of Science and Technology Laboratory Animal Center, National Science Council, Republic of China (Tainan, Taiwan).
1. Constructing the Running Wheel Structure
NOTE: All acrylic should be transparent. Wash the disassembled wheel with water, then use alcohol to wipe the rubber track and acrylic sheets after each use.
- Obtain an acrylic running wheel to be 55 cm in diameter and 15 cm in width.
NOTE: This wheel is larger than a traditional running wheel (diameter = 35 cm; w....
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Results
This section is devoted to comparisons, made 1 week after surgery, on the mNSS scores, incline plane test results and brain infarct volumes among five groups. Figure 4A and 4B present the average mNSS scores and the average of incline plane test results, respectively. The PRW group appears as the best in terms of mNSS improvement. The significant differences between PRW and MRW and between treadmill and PRW clearly suggest that the PRW protects against st.......
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Discussion
This protocol describes a highly effective running wheel system for reducing the severity of the effects of the stroke in animals. As a rat-friendly testbed, this platform is designed as well in such a way that a stable running speed can be maintained by rats throughout a running process by means of a predetermined adaptive acceleration curve. In typical training systems, preset training speeds and durations are set manually. Once an exercise commences, a preset speed is reached very shortly. In this context, i.......
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Disclosures
The authors have nothing to disclose.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Dr. Jhi-Joung Wang, who is the Vice Superintendent of Education at Chi-Mei Medical Center, and Dr. Chih-Chan Lin from the Laboratory Animal Center, Department of Medical Research, Chi-Mei Medical Center, 901 Zhonghua, Yongkang Dist., Tainan City 701, Taiwan, for providing the shooting venue. They would also like to thank Miss Ling-Yu Tang and Mr. Chung-Ham Wang from the Department of Medical Research, Chi-Mei Medical Center, Tainan, Taiwan, for their valuable assistance in demonstrating the prototype system in real experiments with rats. The author gratefully acknowledges the support provided for this study by the Ministry of Science an....
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Materials
| Name | Company | Catalog Number | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brushless DC motor | Oriental Motor | BLEM512-GFS | |
| Motor driver | Oriental Motor | BLED12A | |
| Motor reducer | Oriental Motor | GFS5G20 | |
| Speedometer | Oriental Motor | OPX-2A | |
| Treadmill | Columbus Instruments | Exer-6M | |
| Infrared transmitter | Seeed Studio | TSAL6200 | |
| Infrared Receiver | Seeed Studio | TSOP382 | |
| Microcontroller | Silicon Labs | C8051F330 | |
| CCD camera | Canon Inc. | EOS 450D | |
| Image processing software | Adobe Systems Incorporated | ADOBE Photoshop CS5 12.0 | |
| Image analysis | Media Cybernetics | Pro Plus 4.50.29 | |
| Sodium pentobarbital | Sigma-Aldrich (Saint Louis, MO, USA) | SIGMA P-3761 | |
| Ketamine | Pfizer (Kent, UK) | 1867-66-9 | |
| Atropine | Taiwan Biotech Co., Ltd. (Taoyuan, Taiwan) | A03BA01 | |
| Xylazine | Sigma-Aldrich (Saint Louis, MO, USA) | SIGMA X1126 | |
| Buprenorphine | Sigma-Aldrich (Saint Louis, MO, USA) | B9275 |
References
- Mayo, N. E., Wood-Dauphinee, S., Cote, R., Durcan, L., Carlton, J. Activity, participation, and quality of life 6 months poststroke. Arch Phys Med Rehabil. 83 (8), 1035-1042 (2002).
- Duncan, P. W., Goldstein, L. B., Horner, R. D., Landsman, P. B., Samsa, G. P., Matchar, D. B. Simi....
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