Otabi Hikari, Goto Tatsuhiko, Okayama Tsuyoshi, Kohari Daisuke, Toyoda Atsushi
College of Agriculture, Ibaraki University, Ami, Ibaraki 300-0393, Japan.
College of Agriculture, Ibaraki University, Ami, Ibaraki 300-0393, Japan; Ibaraki University Cooperation between Agriculture and Medical Science (IUCAM), Ami, Ibaraki 300-0393, Japan.
Behav Processes. 2016 Jan;122:21-5. doi: 10.1016/j.beproc.2015.10.018. Epub 2015 Oct 31.
Behavioral and physiological evaluations of animal models of depression are essential to thoroughly understand the mechanisms of depression in humans. Various models have been developed and characterized, and the socially defeated mouse has been widely used for studying depression. Here, we developed and characterized a mouse model of social aversion using a subchronic and mild social defeat stress (sCSDS) paradigm. Compared to control mice, sCSDS mice showed significantly increased body weight gain, water intake, and social aversion to dominant mice on the social interaction test. We observed nest building behavior in sCSDS mice using the pressed cotton as a nest material. Although sCSDS mice eventually successfully built nests, the onset of nest building was severely delayed compared to control mice. The underlying mechanism of this significant delay in nest building by sCSDS mice is unclear. However, our results demonstrate that nest building evaluation is a simple and useful assay for understanding behavior in socially defeated mice and screening drugs such as antidepressants.
对抑郁症动物模型进行行为学和生理学评估对于深入理解人类抑郁症的机制至关重要。人们已经开发并表征了各种模型，社会挫败小鼠已被广泛用于研究抑郁症。在此，我们使用亚慢性轻度社会挫败应激（sCSDS）范式开发并表征了一种社会厌恶小鼠模型。与对照小鼠相比，sCSDS小鼠在社会互动测试中体重增加、饮水量显著增加，并且对优势小鼠表现出明显的社会厌恶。我们使用压制棉花作为筑巢材料观察了sCSDS小鼠的筑巢行为。尽管sCSDS小鼠最终成功筑巢，但与对照小鼠相比，筑巢的开始严重延迟。sCSDS小鼠筑巢显著延迟的潜在机制尚不清楚。然而，我们的结果表明，筑巢评估是一种简单而有用的试验，可用于理解社会挫败小鼠的行为并筛选抗抑郁药等药物。
