Restraint to Induce Stress in Mice and Rats

Summary

This article covers the procedures to induce stress responses using physical restraint stress in mice and rats. Additional considerations that should be observed when selecting and using restraint stress in rodent models are discussed.

Abstract

Across all animal species, exposure to stressful conditions induces stress responses. One method to study the effects of stress using rodent models is the restraint stress procedure. Restraint stress has been used for decades to investigate changes in physiology, genetics, neurobiology, immunology, and other systems impacted by stress. Due to the ease of performing the procedure, low cost, and numerous modifications to scale for the intensity and duration of stress exposure, a vast literature of studies has used restraint stress in mice and rats. As one example, this study presents previously published data showing the impact of restraint stress in transgenic mice on plasma corticosterone levels and optogenetically-induced norepinephrine release. Acute restraint stress increased plasma corticosterone levels, yet this effect was blunted in mice following repeat restraint stress. However, stimulated norepinephrine release in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis was increased only in the repeat restraint stress group. These data highlight important considerations of restraint parameters on dependent measures. Additional descriptions of restraint stress in rats are also included for comparison. Finally, the influence of the parameters of the restraint (e.g., acute vs. chronic) and characteristics of the animal subjects (strain, sex, age) are discussed.

Introduction

Due to the universal experience of stress, investigations into the mechanisms of altered responses following stress exposures have been a consistent area of research for several decades¹. These investigations have begun to parse out aspects of stress that may be beneficial to increase adaptability and responsiveness to acute stressors from stress experiences that induce maladaptive alterations of physiological and behavioral functions, often resulting from prolonged exposure to repeated and/or unpredictable stressors. Many of these responses to stressors impact the brain function, the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, the sympathetic a....

Protocol

The experiments and protocols have been approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (mice) and Fairfield University (rats) and follow the guidelines of NIH¹⁰.

1. Restraint stress in mice

NOTE: Mice offer a number of advantages when studying the effects of stress on physiology and neuronal systems. With the prevalence of transgenic mouse lines, mechanisti.......

Discussion

To investigate the effects of stress on physiological, neurobiological, and behavioral functions in rodent models, conditions that produce stress for rodents must be used. Among these considerations are the conditions that produce stress responses in the subject. Restraint is a validated procedure to produce physiological and behavioral responses in rodents matching stress effects in humans. Using a methodology similar to this protocol, restraint has been used to assess a number of molecu.......

Materials

Name	Company	Catalog Number	Comments
50 mL General Purpose Screwcap Conical Tube	Globe Scientific	6288
Disposable Pipette Basin	Fisher Scientific	13-681-500
ELISA Kit for Corticosterone	Arbor Assays	K014-H
Tailveiner Restrainer Tube	Braintree Scientific	RTV