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The touchscreen operant platform for testing learning and memory in rats and mice

Nature Protocols volume 8, pages 1961–1984 (2013)Cite this article

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Abstract

An increasingly popular method of assessing cognitive functions in rodents is the automated touchscreen platform, on which a number of different cognitive tests can be run in a manner very similar to touchscreen methods currently used to test human subjects. This methodology is low stress (using appetitive rather than aversive reinforcement), has high translational potential and lends itself to a high degree of standardization and throughput. Applications include the study of cognition in rodent models of psychiatric and neurodegenerative diseases (e.g., Alzheimer's disease, schizophrenia, Huntington's disease, frontotemporal dementia), as well as the characterization of the role of select brain regions, neurotransmitter systems and genes in rodents. This protocol describes how to perform four touchscreen assays of learning and memory: visual discrimination, object-location paired-associates learning, visuomotor conditional learning and autoshaping. It is accompanied by two further protocols (also published in this issue) that use the touchscreen platform to assess executive function, working memory and pattern separation.

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Figure 1: Flowchart overview of pretraining stages 2–5.
Figure 2: Flowchart overview of the visual discrimination task.
Figure 3: Stimulus pairs recommended for use in visual discrimination and reversal learning.
Figure 4: Flowchart overview of object-location paired-associates learning task.
Figure 5: The six possible trial types in the object-location paired-associates learning task.
Figure 6: Flowchart overview of the VMCL task.
Figure 7: VMCL discriminative stimuli.
Figure 8: Flowchart overview of the autoshaping task.
Figure 9: Illustrations of Campden Instruments touchscreen chamber apparatus.
Figure 10: Annotated photographs of a Campden Instruments rat touchscreen chamber.
Figure 11: Visual discrimination acquisition.
Figure 12: Data from the autoshaping task.

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Acknowledgements

The protocols described here are those that are currently used in our laboratory, and they were written by current members of the group. However, many researchers have contributed to the development of touchscreen tasks, and we gratefully acknowledge their contribution. They include S. Bartko, J. Brigman, S. Forwood, C. Graybeal, A. Izquierdo, L. Lyon, A. Marti, K. McAllister, S. McTighe, J. Nithianantharajah, C. Romberg, J. Talpos and B. Winters. The research leading to these results has received support from the Innovative Medicine Initiative Joint Undertaking under grant agreement no. 115008, of which resources are composed of a European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations in-kind contribution and financial contribution from the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013); the Wellcome Trust/Medical Research Council (089703/Z/09/Z) and Alzheimer's Research UK (ART/PG2006/5). A.E.H. receives funding from the European Union Seventh Framework Programme under grant agreement nos. 241995 (Project 'GENCODYS') and 242167 (Project 'SYNSYS'). J.A. was supported by the Swedish Academy of Pharmaceutical Sciences. A.H. was supported by the NIAAA Intramural Research Program.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Synome Ltd., Babraham Research Campus, Cambridge, UK

    Alexa E Horner

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Alexa E Horner, Christopher J Heath, Martha Hvoslef-Eide, Brianne A Kent, Chi Hun Kim, Simon R O Nilsson, Johan Alsiö, Charlotte A Oomen, Lisa M Saksida & Timothy J Bussey

  3. Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Alexa E Horner, Christopher J Heath, Martha Hvoslef-Eide, Brianne A Kent, Chi Hun Kim, Simon R O Nilsson, Johan Alsiö, Charlotte A Oomen, Lisa M Saksida & Timothy J Bussey

  4. Laboratory of Behavioral and Genomic Neuroscience, National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), US National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA

    Andrew Holmes

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All authors contributed to the writing of this manuscript. A.E.H. coordinated this effort.

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Correspondence to Alexa E Horner.

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Competing interests

L.M.S. and T.J.B. consult for Campden Instruments, Ltd. A.E.H. is an employee of Synome, Ltd.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Data 1

Raw data for visual discrimination acquisition of 10-month-old sham-lesioned control rats (n = 10, with a history of PAL and TUNL) using photographic stimuli (C.A.O., unpublished data). These data were used to plot the graph in Figure 11. (XLSX 12 kb)

Supplementary Video 1

A mouse performing the visual discrimination task with “lines-grid” stimuli in the touchscreen apparatus by Campden Instruments, Ltd. (AVI 14552 kb)

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Horner, A., Heath, C., Hvoslef-Eide, M. et al. The touchscreen operant platform for testing learning and memory in rats and mice. Nat Protoc 8, 1961–1984 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nprot.2013.122

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