I'm currently testing ketamine as an anti-depressant in female ovariectomized rats. Am curious what size field would be ideal to test the effects of ketamine 24h or 1 week after administration.
Hi Collin, I think you could use an apparatus consisted of a white wooden box (100x100x50 cm) placed in a brightly lit room (60 lux in its center) in order to obtain an anxiogenic environment.
This article could be useful for your purpose!
Feel free to contact me, if you have questions! :)
Anna
Hi Collin,
Most use a box similar to what Anna describes. Just make sure you have no shadows. Other suggestions for anxiety tests are a light dark box and an elevated platform test where rats have to climb down from something of a moderate height. It's best to do some testing beforehand to get a height that they will climb down from, but there is a decent latency for this. Experimenting with presence or absence of bedding on the surface below the platform can be useful. Another option is a marble burying test.
Hi Collin,
I do not think there is any unique suitable measure for an open-field. You just want to have a bright open area surrounded by walls. We currently use a 90x90x30-cm field. As Benjamin said, be sure that you don't have any shadow on the arena, specially if you are recording the animal's movement from above.
Just as an advice, an OF maybe is not the best test to assess anxiety. Is true that you can use, for example, the time in the central area and/or the ratio of distances (total vs distance travelled in the center) as an anxiety score, but as Benjamin pointed out, there are many others that might be more informative, such as the elevated plus maze, the light/dark test, or the marble/digging test. If you do want to use the OF, check for other parameters related to anxiety to be analized, such as the number of defecations, vertical activity, etc.
Best
Fiona
As Fiona mentioned, there are other anxiogenic models that could be used. Marble burying is not common in rats, not sure if that's because there are more accepted methods (e.g. elevated plus maze) or if rats engage in less burying behaviors compared to mice. I have used fecal boli in an empty home cage, and compared to a home cage placed on a pan of ice. The slight stress of the ice induces more fecal boli. Be aware however that even though this is likely stress related, it also likely engages a different subset of circuits . Nonetheless a relatively easy measure to conduct.
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