VA Puget Sound Health Care System

A method to assess exercise endurance in laboratory mice without the use of a shock grid is demonstrated. This method is a humane refinement that can decrease the confounding effects of stress on experimental parameters.

Stress-induced elevations in glucose levels can confound interpretation of data derived from a conscious intraperitoneal insulin tolerance test in mice. In this article, we describe a method to acclimate the mice to handling, injections and blood sampling prior to performing the insulin tolerance test in order to limit stress-induced hyperglycemia.

Here, we present a protocol that demonstrates the technique and necessary controls for Laser Doppler perfusion imaging to measure blood flow in the mouse hindlimb.

Presented here are methods for producing repeated low-intensity blast exposures using mice.