I have 2 group of mice, one of them should have seizure like behaviors, however, I didn't notice that phenotype, so I want to induce seizure in mice, and check if there are some difference between the 2 groups, anyone can give me some suggestions? thanks a lot! Hailong Hou
I'm sorry, I hadn't understood idea: do you need spontaneous seizures or do you want to induced them by some drug?
to induce epileptiform activity, easiest would be injecting something like pilocarpine, pentylenetetrazole or kainate IP, or giving ECS with corneal electrodes.
send me a message if you need specific protocols for either, but specifics will depend on the type and severity of seizure you want to trigger, as well as the genetic background and age of your mice.
what will you use as an endpoint? seizure severity (Racine 1972 scale or similar), seizure latency and seizure duration can all be quantified by simple observation, whereas more complex measures like video-EEG will give you a better idea of the seizure activity.
you could also use fancier methods to induce seizures like drug microinjection or precise electrical microstimulation, but those would require stereotaxic injections.
if you think your mice might show differences in epileptogenesis, you could test them with chemical or electrical kindling protocols, or look at spontaneous recurrent epileptiform discharges after status epilepticus.
ECS is a good idea which we regularly do to induce seizure in mice. The only thing is you have to standardise the pulse. We standardised for adult C57 male mice and use the shock pulse machine of Ugo Basile. Please read the following paper however that is for rat but you will have base to work.
J Neurosci. 2004 Jun 16;24(24):5603-10.
Hope it helps.
