evaluating-skilled-prehension-in-mice-using-an-auto-trainer

Evaluating Skilled Prehension in Mice Using an Auto-Trainer

We describe a method to introduce na&#239;ve mice to a novel prehension (reach-to-grasp) task. Mice are housed singly in cages with a frontal slot that ...

Johns Hopkins University

Data from both humans and animal models suggest that most recovery from motor impairment after stroke occurs in a sensitive period that lasts only weeks and is mediated, in part, by an increased responsiveness to training. Here, we used a mouse model of focal cortical stroke to test 2 hypotheses. First, we investigated whether responsiveness to training decreases over time after stroke. Second, we tested whether fluoxetine, which can influence synaptic plasticity and stroke recovery, can prolong the period over which large training-related gains can be elicited after stroke.

Fluoxetine Maintains a State of Heightened Responsiveness to Motor Training Early After Stroke in a Mouse Model.

Prior studies have suggested that after stroke there is a time-limited period of increased responsiveness to training as a result of heightened plasticity-a sensitive period thought to be induced by ischemia itself. Using a mouse model, we have previously shown that most training-associated recovery after a caudal forelimb area (CFA) stroke occurs in the first week and is attributable to reorganization in a medial premotor area (AGm). The existence of a stroke-induced sensitive period leads to the counterintuitive prediction that a second stroke should reopen this window and promote full recovery from the first stroke. To test this prediction, we induced a second stroke in the AGm of mice with incomplete recovery after a first stroke in CFA.

Robert Hubbard

Department of Neurology

Johns Hopkins University

Evaluating Skilled Prehension in Mice Using an Auto-Trainer