Intensive longitudinal characterization of multidimensional biobehavioral dynamics in laboratory rats
Mehrdad Hasanpour,
Ekaterina Mitricheva,
Nikos Logothetis,
Hamid R. Noori
Affiliations
Mehrdad Hasanpour
Department of Physiology of Cognitive Processes, Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, Germany
Ekaterina Mitricheva
Department of Physiology of Cognitive Processes, Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, Germany; International Center for Primate Brain Research, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology (CEBSIT)/Institute of Neuroscience (ION), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
Nikos Logothetis
Department of Physiology of Cognitive Processes, Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, Germany; International Center for Primate Brain Research, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology (CEBSIT)/Institute of Neuroscience (ION), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China; Imaging Science and Biomedical Engineering, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
Hamid R. Noori
Department of Physiology of Cognitive Processes, Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen, Germany; International Center for Primate Brain Research, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology (CEBSIT)/Institute of Neuroscience (ION), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China; McGovern Institute for Brain Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA; Corresponding author
Summary: Rats have been used as animal models for human diseases for more than a century, yet a systematic understanding of basal biobehavioral phenotypes of laboratory rats is still missing. In this study, we utilize wireless tracking technology and videography, collect and analyze more than 130 billion data points to fill this gap, and characterize the evolution of behavior and physiology of group-housed male and female rats (n = 114) of the most commonly used strains (Lister Hooded, Long-Evans, Sprague-Dawley, and Wistar) throughout their development. The resulting intensive longitudinal data suggest the existence of strain and sex differences and bi-stable developmental states. Under standard laboratory 12-h light/12-h dark conditions, our study found the presence of multiple oscillations such as circatidal-like rhythms in locomotor activity. The overall findings further suggest that frequent movement along cage walls or thigmotaxic activity may be a physical feature of motion in constrained spaces, critically affecting the interpretation of basal behavior of rats in cages.
