Water Maze

Apparatus

We propose an ivory-colored cuve in polyethylen, whose diamater may be customized.

The cuve lays on an aluminum structure, in order to allow a good ventilation and to facilitate a good drain of the liquid from the cuve. We install the draining system under the cuve and the tubing to the evacuation.

A height-adjustable platform is provided with the water maze.

The detection of the animal is processed by our Videotracking system. The video camera is fixed on a horizontal aluminum bar, which we install above the cuve.

Get 2 cuves for the price of 1 (for both Rats and Mice)

Turn a large cuve into a smaller with our diameter reductor. To save room and money, we propose a ring to reduce the diameter of the water maze. You may this way have a small 120cm diameter cuve inside a large 180cm one, and thus run experiments with mice without needing an additional cuve.

Software

Our Videotracking system detects the animal in real time and communicates its coordinates to our experiment management software. The latter calculates the time spent in the different customized zones of the maze, the distance traveled within each zone, the latency to find the platform,… All these data are stored to be analyzed a posteriori.

Our software allows:

• the video display,
• the calculation of relevent times, such as exploration duration, time to reach the platform,…
• the calculation of the number of entries and the time spent in customized areas of interest,
• the management of successive sessions,
• storing all the behavioral data and videos,
• playing the video again with different definition of zones, in order to exploit the acquired data the best way.

Moreover, the succession of positions of the animal are stored in a specific file, in order to display the detailed path of the animal during the experiment.

A large number of variables may be obtained. They are arranged in a Microsoft Excel compatible file:

• time to reach the platform,
• distance traveled in each quadrant,
• time spent in each quadrant,
• distance traveled,
• Gallagher proximity (mean distance to the platform),
• Whishaw Index,
• Efficiency Index,
• Cumulated distance error to the goal,
• Thigmotaxis Index, etc.

The Imetronic +

We propose a turnkey installation of the Water Maze, so that we install the whole setup:

• aluminum bar to fix the video camera,
• aluminum structure,
• the cuve,
• the draining system and tubing.

Once our installation finished, you may fill in the cuve and you are 100% ready to run an experiment.

The location of the animal is processed by our videotracking software.

We install the video camera in your room on an aluminium bar. No holes in the walls are required for the installation of the bar.

Coupling with Optogenetics

We propose solutions to couple the analysis of the behavior in the water maze with and optogenetic activation.

We developed:

• a rotation and stretching compensator, compatible with any optical commutator,
• a device to activate lasers. This accessory sends electric signals up to 500Hz. The experimenter decides the exact moment according to clocks or behavioral outputs at which a customized train of pulses may be sent to the laser to specifically activate the aimed bunch of neurons.