title: Automated home cage assessment shows behavioral changes in a transgenic mouse model of spinocerebellar ataxia type 17.
abstract: Spinocerebellar Ataxia type 17 (SCA17) is an autosomal dominantly inherited, neurodegenerative disease characterized by ataxia, involuntary movements, and dementia. A novel SCA17 mouse model having a 71 polyglutamine repeat expansion in the TATA-binding protein (TBP) has shown age related motor deficit using a classic motor test, yet concomitant weight increase might be a confounding factor for this measurement. In this study we used an automated home cage system to test several motor readouts for this same model to confirm pathological behavior results and evaluate benefits of automated home cage in behavior phenotyping. Our results confirm motor deficits in the Tbp/Q71 mice and present previously unrecognized behavioral characteristics obtained from the automated home cage, indicating its use for high-throughput screening and testing, e.g. of therapeutic compounds.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Medical Genetics and Applied Genomics, University of Tuebingen, Tuebingen, Germany.
authors.forename: Esteban
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Portal
authors.forename: Olaf
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Riess
authors.forename: Huu Phuc
authors.initials: HP
authors.lastname: Nguyen
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D000818:Animals; D001835:Body Weight / Q000235:genetics; D002940:Circadian Rhythm / Q000235:genetics; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D004435:Eating / Q000235:genetics; D001330:Electronic Data Processing; D005106:Exploratory Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000209:etiology*; D051379:Mice; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D009043:Motor Activity / Q000235:genetics; D012044:Regression Analysis; D020754:Spinocerebellar Ataxias / Q000150:complications* / Q000235:genetics*; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D035181:TATA-Box Binding Protein / Q000235:genetics*; D019680:Trinucleotide Repeat Expansion / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D035181:TATA-Box Binding Protein; C509817:TBP protein, human