A potential source for the failure of translation is an inadequate use of models. Rats and mice are commonly used, but often treated as either “miniature humans”, assuming that they perceive the world as we do, or as “test substances” that can be stored between uses, ignoring the life of the animal before and between experiments. Instead, we should appreciate the animal for itself and acknowledge its natural ecological niche. Rodents rely on numerous senses, yet most conventional housing and handling practices do not reflect natural habits of these animals. 

The aim of this project is to improve this by systematically evaluating handling and housing conditions on standard testing procedures to develop more naturalistic approaches. Previous experiences affect how we learn, process and react to new experiences, which is rarely considered in test rodents. We compare experimenter pre-handling as well as housing conditions on wild-type mice and rats. The animals are tested in standard tests for anxiety and other core-symptoms as well as standard and novel memory tests. 

Following that, we test selected disease models (here ASD) to extend the validation. We aim at developing novel behavioural tests combined with machine-learning to increase the amount of data we can mine from each animal and see if we can achieve similar or better results with less-stressful, novel tests than with existing paradigms. These refinements can in the long run lead to a reduction of the number of animals needed and potentially improve the translation of animal research to human conditions. 

The host lab (RU) is expert in developing novel behavioural paradigms and combining these with modelling and data-driven approaches.