Phillips Kimberley A, Hambright M Karen, Hewes Kelly, Schilder Brian M, Ross Corinna N, Tardif Suzette D
Department of Psychology, Trinity University, San Antonio, TX 78212, United States; Southwest National Primate Research Center, Texas Biomedical Research Institute, San Antonio, TX, United States.
Department of Social Sciences, College of Coastal Georgia, Brunswick, GA 31520, United States.
J Neurosci Methods. 2015 Jun 15;248:27-31. doi: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2015.03.023. Epub 2015 Mar 31.
The common marmoset (Callithrix jacchus) is a small, New World primate that is used extensively in biomedical and behavioral research. This short-lived primate, with its small body size, ease of handling, and docile temperament, has emerged as a valuable model for aging and neurodegenerative research. A growing body of research has indicated exercise, aerobic exercise especially, imparts beneficial effects to normal aging. Understanding the mechanisms underlying these positive effects of exercise, and the degree to which exercise has neurotherapeutic effects, is an important research focus. Thus, developing techniques to engage marmosets in aerobic exercise would have great advantages.
Here we describe the marmoset exercise ball (MEB) paradigm: a safe (for both experimenter and subjects), novel and effective means to engage marmosets in aerobic exercise. We trained young adult male marmosets to run on treadmills for 30 min a day, 3 days a week.
Our training procedures allowed us to engage male marmosets in this aerobic exercise within 4 weeks, and subjects maintained this frequency of exercise for 3 months.
To our knowledge, this is the first described method to engage marmosets in aerobic exercise. A major advantage of this exercise paradigm is that while it was technically forced exercise, it did not appear to induce stress in the marmosets.
These techniques should be useful to researchers wishing to address physiological responses of exercise in a marmoset model.
普通狨猴（Callithrix jacchus）是一种小型的新大陆灵长类动物，广泛应用于生物医学和行为研究。这种寿命较短的灵长类动物，体型小、易于处理且性情温顺，已成为衰老和神经退行性疾病研究的重要模型。越来越多的研究表明，运动，尤其是有氧运动，对正常衰老具有有益影响。了解运动这些积极作用的潜在机制以及运动具有神经治疗作用的程度，是一个重要的研究重点。因此，开发让狨猴进行有氧运动的技术将具有很大优势。
在这里，我们描述了狨猴运动球（MEB）范式：一种让狨猴进行有氧运动的安全（对实验者和受试者而言）、新颖且有效的方法。我们训练成年雄性狨猴每天在跑步机上跑步30分钟，每周3天。
我们的训练程序使雄性狨猴在4周内能够进行这种有氧运动，并且受试者保持这种运动频率达3个月。
据我们所知，这是首次描述的让狨猴进行有氧运动的方法。这种运动范式的一个主要优点是，虽然从技术上讲它是强迫运动，但似乎并未在狨猴中诱发应激反应。
这些技术对于希望在狨猴模型中研究运动生理反应的研究人员应该是有用的。
