Data Acquisition and Analysis In Brainstem Evoked Response Audiometry In Mice

Andreas Lundt; Julien Soos; Christina Henseler; Muhammad Imran Arshaad; Ralf Müller; Dan Ehninger; Jürgen Hescheler; Agapios Sachinidis; Karl Broich; Carola Wormuth; Anna Papazoglou; Marco Weiergräber

doi:10.3791/59200

A subscription to JoVE is required to view this content. Sign in or start your free trial.

Method Article

Data Acquisition and Analysis In Brainstem Evoked Response Audiometry In Mice

12K views

⸱

DOI:

10.3791/59200

⸱

May 10th, 2019

Andreas Lundt¹^,² , Julien Soos¹ , Christina Henseler¹ , Muhammad Imran Arshaad¹ , Ralf Müller³ , Dan Ehninger⁴ , Jürgen Hescheler⁵ , Agapios Sachinidis⁵ , Karl Broich⁶ , Carola Wormuth¹^,⁷ , Anna Papazoglou¹ , Marco Weiergräber¹

¹Experimental Neuropsychopharmacology, Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices, ²KBRwyle GmbH, ³Cognitive Neurophysiology, Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Faculty of Medicine, University of Cologne, ⁴Molecular and Cellular Cognition, German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE), ⁵Institute of Neurophysiology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Cologne, ⁶Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM), ⁷Thescon GmbH

Summary

Brainstem evoked response audiometry is an important tool in clinical neurophysiology. Nowadays, brainstem evoked response audiometry is also applied in the basic science and preclinical studies involving both pharmacological and genetic animal models. Here we provide a detailed description of how auditory brainstem responses can be successfully recorded and analyzed in mice.

Abstract

Brainstem evoked response audiometry (BERA) is of central relevance in the clinical neurophysiology. As other evoked potential (EP) techniques, such as visually evoked potentials (VEPs) or somatosensory evoked potentials (SEPs), the auditory evoked potentials (AEPs) are triggered by the repetitive presentation of identical stimuli, the electroencephalographic (EEG) response of which is subsequently averaged resulting in distinct positive (p) and negative (n) deflections. In humans, both the amplitude and the latency of individual peaks can be used to characterize alterations in synchronization and conduction velocity in the underlying neuronal circuitries. Importantly, AEPs are also applied in basic and preclinical science to identify and characterize the auditory function in pharmacological and genetic animal models. Even more, animal models in combination with pharmacological testing are utilized to investigate for potential benefits in the treatment of sensorineural hearing loss (e.g., age- or noise-induced hearing deficits). Here we provide a detailed and integrative description of how to record auditory brainstem-evoked responses (ABRs) in mice using click and tone-burst application. A specific focus of this protocol is on pre-experimental animal housing, anesthesia, ABR recording, ABR filtering processes, automated wavelet-based amplitude growth function analysis, and latency detection.

Introduction

A central aspect of brain physiology is its capability to process environmental information resulting in different intrinsic or extrinsic output, such as learning, memory, emotional reactions, or motoric responses. Various experimental and diagnostic approaches can be used to characterize the electrophysiological responsiveness of individual neuronal cell types or clusters/ensembles of neurons within a stimulus-related neuronal circuitry. These electrophysiological techniques cover different spatiotemporal dimensions on the micro-, meso- and macroscale¹. The microscale level includes voltage and current clamp approaches in different patch-clamp....