Building A Better Mousetrap: Novel Object Location Versus Novel Object Recognition

Bussard, Morgan

Publication

Building A Better Mousetrap: Novel Object Location Versus Novel Object Recognition

Bussard, Morgan

Date

2022

Additional date(s)

5/19/2022

Abstract

Alzheimer's Disease (AD) is often associated with patterns of chronic inflammation and cognitive dysfuntion. Much of our lab's research involves studying how AD-like pathologies change and affect learning and memory. Our lab has developed a learning task in which object location memory (OLM) is tested in mice. Briefly, a mouse is placed into an arena with two identical objects for a training session. Four hours later, one of the objects is moved to a novel location, and the mouse is placed back into the arena for the testing session. Because mice exhibit a preference for novelty, memory is assessed as the amount of time the mouse spends exploring the moved object divided by the total time spent exploring both objects. Our goal is to identify testing parameters that make this task both accurate and efficient, as we will add this learning paradigm to a battery of other behavioral tasks in our lab to be used in future experiments. In this current study, the OLM protocol was performed twice according to two different experimental timelines that test the effects of adding an additional training session to the original protocol.