title: Treadmill performance of mice with cerebellar lesions: 2. Lurcher mutant mice.
abstract: The sensorimotor skills of a spontaneous mouse mutant with cerebellar cortical atrophy, Lurcher, were examined on either a fast or a slow treadmill inclined at one of three slopes, requiring forward movements in order to avoid footshocks. During the early part of acquisition, Lurcher mutants had lower latencies before falling on either treadmill than normal mice, but not during a retention test. For both Lurcher mutants and controls, the amount of time spent walking as a function of time spent on the belt increased with an increase in belt speed. Lurcher mutants had higher walking time/total time ratios on the slow but not on the fast treadmill. It is concluded that cerebellar cortical degeneration impaired the time course of acquisition but not long-term retention of the treadmill task.
authors.affiliation: Centre Hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal, Pavillon Hôtel-Dieu, Service de Neurologie, Unité de Neurologie du Comportement, Neurobiologie et Neuropsychologie, Montréal, Québec, H2W 1T8, Canada.
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Le Marec
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Lalonde
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001362:Avoidance Learning / Q000502:physiology; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002525:Cerebellar Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*; D005260:Female; D008124:Locomotion / Q000502:physiology*; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D008808:Mice, Inbred CBA; D008818:Mice, Neurologic Mutants; D009042:Motivation; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology*; D012153:Retention, Psychology / Q000502:physiology; D013132:Spinocerebellar Degenerations / Q000503:physiopathology