The authors wish to acknowledge funding from UL1TR000071 (NCATS), P30DK079638 (NIDDK), P30DA028821 (NIDA) and T32DA07287 (NIDA).

All experimental procedures are in accordance with the Guide for the Care and Use of Laboratory Animals (Institute of Laboratory Animal Resources (U.S.), 1996) and with the approval of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee at the University of Texas Medical Branch.
1. Subjects
<ol>
	<li>Single house male Sprague-Dawley rats weighing 225-250 g at 21 &#176;C and 30-50% relative humidity with a 12 hr light-dark cycle (lights on 6:00 am-6:00 pm).</li>
	<li>Maintain rats on a low fat food (10% fat by energy). Habituate rats to food and colony room for at least 7 days prior to experimentation. Animals are habituated to handling and dosing of vehicle for three days prior to starting the studies. The first day after habituation is experimental Day 1.</li>
</ol>
2. Baseline Preference
<ol>
	<li>Day 1, fill two clean food hoppers, one marked with an A and the other with B, with 10% fat food for each cage. Weigh the food hoppers (with food) and place them in the cage, ensuring the rat has access to both.</li>
	<li>Day 2, at approximately the same time food hoppers were placed in the cage the day before, record the food hopper weights and switch the positions of hopper A and hopper B. This mitigates position bias. Always examine the home cage for any food removed from the hopper, weigh it, and account for it. Food intake is measured by change in hopper weight between days.</li>
	<li>Day 3, record the food hopper weights as before. Examine the amount of food consumed in each food hopper position and food hopper identification (A and B). This data gives a baseline understanding of position bias and specific hopper preference, and should have a preference score of approximately 50% indicating no preference. Throw out the remaining food.</li>
</ol>
3. Fat Preference
<ol>
	<li>Day 3, obtain two clean food hoppers for each cage. It is important to use clean food hoppers whenever switching between the different foods to prevent confounding scents from previous experiments. Fill hopper A with 12.5% fat food and hopper B with 15% fat food (Table 1). Record the starting weights of each hopper and place both in the cage.</li>
	<li>Day 4, record the weights of each hopper, switching the positions of hopper A and hopper B upon placing them back in the cage.</li>
	<li>Day 5, record the weights of each hopper. After determining the grams of each food consumed on both days, the rat&#8217;s food preference can be determined.</li>
	<li>Repeat steps 3.1 through 3.3 multiple times with the same animals using 12.5% fat food as compared to foods with increasing fat content (e.g. first 15%, next 17.5%, then 20%, and lastly 45% fat).</li>
</ol>
4. Data Calculations and Analysis
<ol>
	<li>Calculate the daily food intake for each animal by subtracting the final mass of the food+hopper from the starting mass of the food+hopper. Because each food is measured over 2&#160;days, the 2&#160;day total can be added together for each % fat content.</li>
	<li>Calculate the fat preference score by dividing the intake of the higher fat food from the total food consumed over each two day period. For example, one rat ate 8.9 g&#160;of the 12.5% fat diet and 27.5 g &#160;of the 17.5% diet over 2&#160;days. Therefore the preference score for that individual animal is 76% (27.5 divided by 36.4).</li>
	<li>Average and graph the preference score for each diet (15%, 17.5%, 20%, and 45% fat) (Figure 3). The total food intake is also informative and can readily be plotted as grams (Figure 4).</li>
	<li>Express the preference score (Figure 5A) and total food intake (Figure 5B) as a function of total energy intake (kilocalories) using the energy density in Table 1.</li>
	<li>If using more than one group of animals, perform a two-way repeated measures ANOVA followed by a Bonferroni post-test. Power analysis indicates that n = 8 animals per group is appropriate for detecting a difference of 7% between treatment groups.</li>
</ol>

<ol>
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Nutr. 67, 505-512 (1998).</li><li>Sclafani, A., Ackroff, K. <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=PubMed&cmd=Search&doptcmdl=Citation&defaultField=Title+Word&term=Role+of+gut+nutrient+sensing+in+stimulating+appetite+and+conditioning+food+preferences.">Role of gut nutrient sensing in stimulating appetite and conditioning food preferences.</a> Am. J. Physiol. Regul. Integr. Comp. Physiol. 302 (10), (2012).</li><li>Velloso, L. A. <a target="_blank" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=PubMed&cmd=Search&doptcmdl=Citation&defaultField=Title+Word&term=The+brain+is+the+conductor:+diet-induced+inflammation+overlapping+physiological+control+of+body+mass+and+metabolism.">The brain is the conductor: diet-induced inflammation overlapping physiological control of body mass and metabolism.</a> Arq. Bras. Endocrinol. Metabol. 53 (2), 151-158 (2009).</li><li>Vanzela, E. 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The authors have nothing to disclose.

The Fat Preference model is an informative and easy to perform assay of feeding behavior. This assay offers an opportunity to identify neural and molecular mechanisms which underlie food preference, which is an important yet understudied area of obesity research. Changes in fat preference from genetic differences or pharmacological manipulations could be visualized as rightward or leftward shifts in the preference curve (Figure 3B). It is important to include the middle fat foods (15%, 17.5%, and 20%) to...

Obesity is a prevalent problem in the United States1, with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimating that over a third of American adults are obese. Obesity has also been identified as a risk factor for numerous health concerns, including type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol2. While many factors have been shown to influence the increase in obesity rates, there is ongoing interest and controversy in the role macronutrients play in obesity3,4.
One contributing factor to obesity is high dietary fat intake5. Increased dietary fat is correlated with increased human energy consumption6 and significant increases in body fat content7,8. Additionally, dietary fat has reward value both during and after consumption7,9. Therefore, determining what factors influence preference for high fat foods can both guide pharmacotherapeutic design and promote understanding of the underlying dietary choices that can lead to obesity. The Fat Preference model described here tests for rats&#8217; preference between foods of differing fat content, but similar nutritional value. Specifically, this model presents the rats with a choice of two different foods simultaneously thus enabling the quantification of preference based on grams consumed of the lower fat food verses the higher fat food. Pharmacological and genetic effects can be measured as a change in preference for the food with higher fat content.
The Fat Preference model serves to complement the widely used palatable food intake models10 but also offers several advantages. This model allows the experimenter to specifically assess feeding behavior in a controlled environment in which two food options are available. Traditional high fat feeding models only offer one food which eliminates the capacity to study food choice, an important aspect of human food intake. Some assays do offer multiple food types and are often referred to as &#34;cafeteria&#34; type feeding studies11. These studies suffer from reproducibility because human food is often used in the assay and is not well suited to the laboratory environment due to nutrient variability. We use defined diets which contain individual purified ingredients thus greatly improving reproducibility and flexibility to change macronutrient content such as dietary fat. With higher dietary fat intake associated with obesity in humans5 and the natural human preference for higher fat foods12, treatments that alter rat preference for high fat foods can provide valuable insight into obesity.

<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="673">
	<colgroup>
		<col />
		<col />
		<col />
		<col />
	</colgroup>
	<tbody>
		<tr height="22">
			<td height="22" style="height:22px;width:277px;">&#160;Rodent diet with 10 kcal% fat&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Research Diets</td>
			<td style="width:119px;">D12450B</td>
			<td style="width:167px;">10 % fat rat food</td>
		</tr>
		<tr height="22">
			<td height="22" style="height:22px;width:277px;">&#160;Rodent diet with 12.5 kcal% fat&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Research Diets</td>
			<td style="width:119px;">D07040501</td>
			<td>12.5 % fat rat food</td>
		</tr>
		<tr height="22">
			<td height="22" style="height:22px;width:277px;">&#160;Rodent diet with 15 kcal% fat&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Research Diets</td>
			<td style="width:119px;">D07040502</td>
			<td>15 % fat rat food</td>
		</tr>
		<tr height="22">
			<td height="22" style="height:22px;width:277px;">&#160;Rodent diet with 17.5 kcal% fat&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Research Diets</td>
			<td style="width:119px;">D07040503</td>
			<td>17.5 % fat rat food</td>
		</tr>
		<tr height="22">
			<td height="22" style="height:22px;width:277px;">&#160;Rodent diet with 20 kcal% fat&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Research Diets</td>
			<td style="width:119px;">D07040504</td>
			<td>20 % fat rat food</td>
		</tr>
		<tr height="22">
			<td height="22" style="height:22px;width:277px;">&#160;Rodent diet with 45 kcal% fat&#160;</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Research Diets</td>
			<td style="width:119px;">D12451</td>
			<td>45 % fat rat food</td>
		</tr>
		<tr height="22">
			<td height="22" style="height:22px;width:277px;">Rat feeders (3.75&#34;W x 2.875&#34;D x 5.25&#34;H)</td>
			<td style="width:111px;">Labex of MA</td>
			<td style="width:119px;">2528</td>
			<td>Food hoppers</td>
		</tr>
	</tbody>
</table>

fat preference: a novel model of eating behavior in rats

Obesity is a growing problem in the United States of America, with more than a third of the population classified as obese. One factor contributing to this multifactorial disorder is the consumption of a high fat diet, a behavior that has been shown to increase both caloric intake and body fat content. However, the elements regulating preference for high fat food over other foods remain understudied.
To overcome this deficit, a model to quickly and easily test changes in the preference for dietary fat was developed. The Fat Preference model presents rats with a series of choices between foods with differing fat content. Like humans, rats have a natural bias toward consuming high fat food, making the rat model ideal for translational studies. Changes in preference can be ascribed to the effect of either genetic differences or pharmacological interventions. This model allows for the exploration of determinates of fat preference and screening pharmacotherapeutic agents that influence acquisition of obesity.

Rats had physical access to both food hoppers simultaneously (Figure 1) in order to demonstrate preference for available food choices with differing fat content (Table 1). Rat food was weighed daily and any food spillage was easily found and accounted for (Figure 2). Spillage of fine food particles was found to be minimal and does not substantially influence the data. Using the Fat Preference model, a clear preference between foods containing 12.5% fat and higher fat foo...

Watch this Scientific Journal Video about Fat Preference: A Novel Model of Eating Behavior in Rats at JoVE.com

Fat Preference: A Novel Model of Eating Behavior in Rats

Dietary fat content influences both energy intake and body fat composition in mammals. By examining rats&#8217; preference for high fat food in a series of choice experiments, it is possible to test genetic differences and pharmacological interventions on their preference for high fat food.

Obesity is a growing problem in the United States of America, with more than a third of the population classified as obese. One factor contributing to ...

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Behavior

13.1K Views.  University of Texas Medical Branch.  Influenze tenore di grassi alimentari, sia l'apporto energetico e composizione corporea grasso nei mammiferi. Esaminando la preferenza ratti di cibo ricco di grassi in una serie di esperimenti di scelta, è possibile testare le differenze genetiche e interventi farmacologici sulla loro preferenza per il cibo ricco di grassi. 

Video: Fat Preference: A Novel Model of Eating Behavior in Rats

Stereotaxic Microinjection of Viral Vectors Expressing Cre Recombinase to Study the Role of Target Genes in Cocaine Conditioned Place Preference

Microinjecting recombinant adenoassociated viral (rAAV) vectors expressing Cre recombinase into distinct mouse brain regions to selectively knockout genes of interest allows for enhanced temporally- and regionally-specific control of gene deletion, compared to existing methods. While conditional deletion can also be achieved by mating mice that express Cre recombinase under the control of specific gene promoters with mice carrying a floxed gene, stereotaxic microinjection allows for targeting of discrete brain areas at experimenter-determined time points of interest. In the context of cocaine conditioned place preference, and other cocaine behavioral paradigms such as self-administration or psychomotor sensitization that can involve withdrawal, extinction and/or reinstatement phases, this technique is particularly useful in exploring the unique contribution of target genes to these distinct phases of behavioral models of cocaine-induced plasticity. Specifically, this technique allows for selective ablation of target genes during discrete phases of a behavior to test their contribution to the behavior across time. Ultimately, this understanding allows for more targeted therapeutics that are best able to address the most potent risk factors that present themselves during each phase of addictive behavior.

This article describes how to microinject viral vectors into mouse brain and then test in a conditioned place preference paradigm that includes an acquisition, extinction and reinstatement phase.

Microinjecting recombinant adenoassociated viral (rAAV) vectors expressing Cre recombinase into distinct mouse brain regions to selectively knockout genes ...

Inchworming: A Novel Motor Stereotypy in the BTBR T+ Itpr3tf/J Mouse Model of Autism

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a behaviorally defined neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by decreased reciprocal social interaction, abnormal communication, and repetitive behaviors with restricted interest. As diagnosis is based on clinical criteria, any potentially relevant rodent models of this heterogeneous disorder should ideally recapitulate these diverse behavioral traits. The BTBR T+ Itpr3tf/J (BTBR) mouse is an established animal model of ASD, displaying repetitive behaviors such as increased grooming, as well as cognitive inflexibility. With respect to social interaction and interest, the juvenile play test has been employed in multiple rodent models of ASD. Here, we show that when BTBR mice are tested in a juvenile social interaction enclosure containing sawdust bedding, they display a repetitive synchronous digging motion. This repetitive motor behavior, referred to as &#34;inchworming,&#34; was named because of the stereotypic nature of the movements exhibited by the mice while moving horizontally across the floor. Inchworming mice must use their fore- and hind-limbs in synchrony to displace the bedding, performing a minimum of one inward and one outward motion. Although both BTBR and C56BL/6J (B6) mice exhibit this behavior, BTBR mice demonstrate a significantly higher duration and frequency of inchworming and a decreased latency to initiate inchworming when placed in a bedded enclosure. We conclude that this newly described behavior provides a measure of a repetitive motor stereotypy that can be easily measured in animal models of ASD.

Inchworming: A Novel Motor Stereotypy in the BTBR T+ Itpr3tf/J Mouse Model of Autism

Inchworming is a highly repetitive synchronous digging motion displayed by BTBR T+ Itpr3tf/J (BTBR) mice when placed in a testing cage with sufficient sawdust bedding. The procedure is a modification of the juvenile social interaction protocol and is used here to assess repetitive motor stereotypies relevant to Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a behaviorally defined neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by decreased reciprocal social interaction, abnormal ...

A Novel Procedure for Evaluating the Reinforcing Properties of Tastants in Laboratory Rats: Operant Intraoral Self-administration

This paper describes a novel method for studying the bio-behavioral basis of addiction to food. This method combines the surgical component of taste reactivity with the behavioral aspects of operant self-administration of drugs. Under very brief general anaesthesia, rats are implanted with an intraoral (IO) cannula that allows delivery of test solutions directly in the oral cavity. Animals are then tested in operant self-administration chambers whereby they can press a lever to receive IO infusions of test solutions. IO self-administration has several advantages over experimental procedures that involve drinking a solution from a spout&#160;or operant responding for solid pellets or solutions delivered in a receptacle. Here, we show that IO self-administration can be employed to study self-administration of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). Rats were first tested for self-administration on a progressive ratio (PR) schedule, which assesses the maximum amount of operant behavior that will be emitted for different concentrations of HFCS (i.e.&#160;8%, 25%, and 50%). Following this test, rats self-administered these concentrations on a continuous schedule of reinforcement (i.e.&#160;one infusion for each lever press) for 10 consecutive days (1 session/day; each lasting 3 hr), and then they were retested on the PR schedule. On the continuous reinforcement schedule, rats took fewer infusions of higher concentrations, although the lowest concentration of HFCS (8%) maintained more variable self-administration. Furthermore, the PR tests revealed that 8% had lower reinforcing value than 25% and 50%. These results indicate that IO self-administration can be employed to study acquisition and maintenance of responding for sweet solutions. The sensitivity of the operant response to differences in concentration and schedule of reinforcement makes IO self-administration an ideal procedure to investigate the neurobiology of voluntary intake of sweets.

The current study evaluates a novel procedure for assessing the reinforcing effects of palatable solutions in laboratory rats: intraoral self-administration. To this end, operant responding (i.e.&#160;lever pressing) for intraoral infusions of sweet solutions at different concentrations was measured on continuous and progressive ratios schedules of reinforcement.

This paper describes a novel method for studying the bio-behavioral basis of addiction to food. This method combines the surgical component of taste ...

A Procedure to Observe Context-induced Renewal of Pavlovian-conditioned Alcohol-seeking Behavior in Rats

Environmental contexts in which drugs of abuse are consumed can trigger craving, a subjective Pavlovian-conditioned response that can facilitate drug-seeking behavior and prompt relapse in abstinent drug users. We have developed a procedure to study the behavioral and neural processes that mediate the impact of context on alcohol-seeking behavior in rats. Following acclimation to the taste and pharmacological effects of 15% ethanol in the home cage, male Long-Evans rats receive Pavlovian discrimination training (PDT) in conditioning chambers. In each daily (Mon-Fri) PDT session, 16 trials each of two different 10 sec auditory conditioned stimuli occur. During one stimulus, the CS+, 0.2 ml of 15% ethanol is delivered into a fluid port for oral consumption. The second stimulus, the CS-, is not paired with ethanol. Across sessions, entries into the fluid port during the CS+ increase, whereas entries during the CS- stabilize at a lower level, indicating that a predictive association between the CS+ and ethanol is acquired. During PDT each chamber is equipped with a specific configuration of visual, olfactory and tactile contextual stimuli. Following PDT, extinction training is conducted in the same chamber that is now equipped with a different configuration of contextual stimuli. The CS+ and CS- are presented as before, but ethanol is withheld, which causes a gradual decline in port entries during the CS+. At test, rats are placed back into the PDT context and presented with the CS+ and CS- as before, but without ethanol. This manipulation triggers a robust and selective increase in the number of port entries made during the alcohol predictive CS+, with no change in responding during the CS-. This effect, referred to as context-induced renewal, illustrates the powerful capacity of contexts associated with alcohol consumption to stimulate alcohol-seeking behavior in response to Pavlovian alcohol cues.

A procedure to study the capacity of an alcohol associated environmental context to trigger the renewal of alcohol-seeking behavior in rats is described.

Environmental contexts in which drugs of abuse are consumed can trigger craving, a subjective Pavlovian-conditioned response that can facilitate ...

The Modified Hole Board - Measuring Behavior, Cognition and Social Interaction in Mice and Rats

This protocol describes the modified hole board (mHB), which combines features from a traditional hole board and open field and is designed to measure multiple dimensions of unconditioned behavior in small laboratory mammals (e.g., mice, rats, tree shrews and small primates). This paradigm is a valuable alternative for the use of a behavioral test battery, since a broad behavioral spectrum of an animal&#8217;s behavioral profile can be investigated in one single test.
The apparatus consists of a box, representing the &#8216;protected&#8217; area, separated from a group compartment. A board, on which small cylinders are staggered in three lines, is placed in the center of the box, representing the &#8216;unprotected&#8217; area of the set-up. The cognitive abilities of the animals can be measured by baiting some cylinders on the board and measuring the working and reference memory. Other unconditioned behavior, such as activity-related-, anxiety-related- and social behavior, can be observed using this paradigm. Behavioral flexibility and the ability to habituate to a novel environment can additionally be observed by subjecting the animals to multiple trials in the mHB, revealing insight into the animals&#8217; adaptive capacities.
Due to testing order effects in a behavioral test battery, na&#239;ve animals should be used for each individual experiment. By testing multiple behavioral dimensions in a single paradigm and thereby circumventing this issue, the number of experimental animals used is reduced. Furthermore, by avoiding social isolation during testing and without the need to food deprive the animals, the mHB represents a behavioral test system, inducing if any, very low amount of stress.

This protocol describes the modified hole board, which is a behavioral test set-up that comprises the characteristics of an open field and a traditional hole board. This set-up enables the differential analysis of unconditioned behavior of small laboratory mammals as well as the analysis of cognitive abilities.

This protocol describes the modified hole board (mHB), which combines features from a traditional hole board and open field and is designed to measure ...

The Rodent Psychomotor Vigilance Test (rPVT): A Method for Assessing Neurobehavioral Performance in Rats and Mice

The human Psychomotor Vigilance Test (PVT) is a widely used procedure for measuring changes in fatigue and sustained attention. The present article describes a rodent version of the PVT&#8212;termed the &#34;rPVT&#34;&#8212;that measures similar aspects of attention (i.e., performance accuracy, motor speed, premature responding, and lapses in attention). Data are presented that demonstrate both the short- and long-term usefulness of the rPVT when employed with laboratory rats. Rats easily learn the rPVT, and learning to perform the basic procedure takes less than two weeks of training. Once acquired, rat performances in the rPVT show a high degree of similarity to these same performance measures in the human PVT, including similarities in, lapses in attention, reaction times, vigilance decrements across session time (i.e., the human &#34;time-on-task&#34; effects), and the response-stimulus interval (RSI) effect described for humans. Thus the rPVT can be an extremely valuable tool for assessing the effects of a wide range of variables on sustained attention quite similar to human PVT performances, and thus can be useful for developing novel treatments for neurobehavioral dysfunctions.

The Rodent Psychomotor Vigilance Test rPVT: A Method for Assessing Neurobehavioral Performance in Rats and Mice

A rat version of the human Psychomotor Vigilance Test (PVT) is described that measures aspects of attention similar to those measured with the human PVT, including aspects of human vigilance such as performance accuracy, motor speed, premature responding, and lapses in attention.

The human Psychomotor Vigilance Test (PVT) is a widely used procedure for measuring changes in fatigue and sustained attention. The present article ...

Automated Analysis of a Nematode Population-based Chemosensory Preference Assay

The nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans' compact nervous system of only 302 neurons underlies a diverse repertoire of behaviors. To facilitate the dissection of the neural circuits underlying these behaviors, the development of robust and reproducible behavioral assays is necessary. Previous C. elegans behavioral studies have used variations of a "drop test", a "chemotaxis assay", and a "retention assay" to investigate the response of C. elegans to soluble compounds. The method described in this article seeks to combine the complementary strengths of the three aforementioned assays. Briefly, a small circle in the middle of each assay plate is divided into four quadrants with the control and experimental solutions alternately placed. After the addition of the worms, the assay plates are loaded into a behavior chamber where microscope cameras record the worms' encounters with the treated regions. Automated video analysis is then performed and a preference index (PI) value for each video is generated. The video acquisition and automated analysis features of this method minimizes the experimenter's involvement and any associated errors. Furthermore, minute amounts of the experimental compound are used per assay and the behavior chamber's multi-camera setup increases experimental throughput. This method is particularly useful for conducting behavioral screens of genetic mutants and novel chemical compounds. However, this method is not appropriate for studying stimulus gradient navigation due to the close proximity of the control and experimental solution regions. It should also not be used when only a small population of worms is available. While suitable for assaying responses only to soluble compounds in its current form, this method can be easily modified to accommodate multimodal sensory interaction and optogenetic studies. This method can also be adapted to assay the chemosensory responses of other nematode species.

We present a behavior recording setup and protocol that enables automated analysis of the nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans' preference for soluble compounds in a population-based assay. This article describes the construction of a behavior chamber, the behavioral assay protocol, and video analysis software usage.

The nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans' compact nervous system of only 302 neurons underlies a diverse repertoire of behaviors. To facilitate the dissection ...

Reinstatement of Drug-seeking in Mice Using the Conditioned Place Preference Paradigm

The present protocol describes the Conditioned Place Preference (CPP) as a model of relapse in drug addiction. In this model, animals are first trained to acquire a conditioned place preference in a drug-paired compartment, and after the post-conditioning test, they perform several sessions to extinguish the established preference. The CPP permits the evaluation of the conditioned rewarding effects of drugs related to environmental cues. Then, the extinguished CPP can be robustly reinstated by the non-contingent administration of a priming dose of the drug, and by exposure to stressful stimuli. Both methods will be explained here. When the animal reinitiates the behavioral response, a reinstatement of the conditioned reward is considered to have taken place.
The main advantages of this protocol are that it is non-invasive, inexpensive, and simple with good validity criteria. In addition, it allows the study of different environmental manipulations, such as stress or diet, which can modulate relapse into drug seeking behaviors. However, one limitation is that if the researcher aims to explore the motivation and primary reinforcing effects of the drug, it should be complemented with self-administration procedures, as they involve operant responses of animals.

This protocol describes the Conditioned Place Preference (CPP) as a model of relapse. This procedure permits the measurement of relapse in laboratory animals, considering the impact of drug-associated environmental cues as craving and relapse in abstaining addicts is currently the focus of drug-abuse treatment programs.

The present protocol describes the Conditioned Place Preference (CPP) as a model of relapse in drug addiction. In this model, animals are first trained to ...

A New Method for Inducing a Depression-Like Behavior in Rats

Contagious depression is a phenomenon that is yet to be fully recognized and this stems from insufficient material on the subject. At the moment, there is no existing format for studying the mechanism of action, prevention, containment, and treatment of contagious depression. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to establish the first animal model of contagious depression.
Healthy rats can contract depressive behaviors if exposed to depressed rats. Depression is induced in rats by subjecting them to several manipulations of chronic unpredictable stress (CUS) over 5 weeks, as described in the protocol. A successful sucrose preference test confirmed the development of depression in the rats. The CUS-exposed rats were then caged with na&#239;ve rats from the contagion group (1 na&#239;ve rat/2 depressed rats in a cage) for an additional 5 weeks. 30 social groups were created from the combination of CUS-exposed rats and na&#239;ve rats.
This proposed depression-contagion protocol in animals consists mainly of cohabiting CUS-exposed and healthy rats for 5 weeks. To ensure that this method works, a series of tests are carried out - first, the sucrose preference test upon inducing depression to rats, then, the sucrose preference test, alongside the open field and forced-swim tests at the end of the cohabitation period. Throughout the experiment, rats are given tags and are always returned to their cages after each test.
A few limitations to this method are the weak differences recorded between the experimental and control groups in the sucrose preference test and the irreversible traumatic outcome of the forced swim test. These may be worth considering for suitability before any future application of the protocol. Nonetheless, following the experiment, na&#239;ve rats developed contagion depression after 5 weeks of sharing the same cage with the CUS-exposed rats.

This protocol describes a new model by which healthy rats could contract depression over a given time periodthrough contagion by exposure to chronic unpredictable stressed (CUS) rats.

Contagious depression is a phenomenon that is yet to be fully recognized and this stems from insufficient material on the subject. At the moment, there is ...

Control of Eating Behavior Using a Novel Feedback System

Subjects eat food from a plate that sits on a scale connected to a computer that records the weight loss of the plate during the meal and makes up a curve of food intake, meal duration and rate of eating modeled by a quadratic equation. The purpose of the method is to change eating behavior by providing visual feedback on the computer screen that the subject can adapt to because her/his own rate of eating appears on the screen during the meal. The data generated by the method is automatically analyzed and fitted to the quadratic equation using a custom made algorithm. The method has the advantage of recording eating behavior objectively and offers the possibility of changing eating behavior both in experiments and in clinical practice. A limitation may be that experimental subjects are affected by the method. The same limitation may be an advantage in clinical practice, as eating behavior is more easily stabilized by the method. A treatment that uses this method has normalized body weight and restored the health of several hundred patients with anorexia nervosa and other eating disorders and has reduced the weight and improved the health of severely overweight patients.

Subjects eat food from a plate placed on a scale connected to a computer that records the weight loss of the plate during the meal. Feedback on the computer screen allows the subject to adapt her/his eating behavior to reference curves thus normalizing body weight.

Subjects eat food from a plate that sits on a scale connected to a computer that records the weight loss of the plate during the meal and makes up a curve ...