Second Generation Bussey-Saksida Touch Screen Chamber for Mice

Model 80614A


  • The rodent touchscreen chambers are now used by over 300 Research Groups in at least 26 countries
  • Write your own Tasks or use the 14 pre-written validated Tasks currently available, including all training paradigms as a turn-key solution.
  • Touch Screen Chambers deliver all the Tasks of a traditional lever or nose-poke operant chamber, but they can do so much more.
  • Translational research: the rodents Tasks are virtually identical to tasks used with NHP & human populations on the CANTAB system.
  • A battery of cognitive Tasks for rat and mouse from simple to complex, with training times accordingly from days to weeks.
  • Following 10 years of customer feedback and continuous development, we have redesigned the system to be even more flexible and with more features.
  • Third party systems can be integrated with TTL input and output lines, with low e.m.c. noise 80614EA chambers for integrating with Electrophysiology Recording
 

Details

A Decade of continuous development

​​First developed in the 2009 at Cambridge University, the Bussey Saksida Rodent Touch Screen Chambers are now used by over 300 different Research Groups in at least 26 countries. The Bussey-Saksida Chamber has always featured a unique trapezoidal wall shape in order to focus the animal's attention and facilitates the efficient and high-throughput cognitive evaluation of rodents. The chamber is easily reconfigured to a modular square arena with panels, levers, lights, and a range of other operators to accommodate any task like an operant chamber equipped with a traditional lever or nose-poke.

Evolution: Meet the New Bussey-Saksida Chamber

Diagram of Second Generation Chamber

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Video

The Second Generation Bussey-Saksida chamber was built with video in mind. New non-reflective walls and floors will aid video tracking, and IR and ambient lighting located under the chamber lid provide even lighting of the chamber and eliminate glare.

 

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Tethered Animals

Many accommodations for tethers can be made including updated lid and open reward areas to accommodate headstages. A convenient sliding drawer can be added to the environmental cabinet to neatly store and feed the tether.

 

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Electrophysiology

All electronic components are adjusted to reduce EMC. The environmental cabinet is a Faraday cage to prevent outside noise from the surrounding area from entering the chamber. Even the touch screen itself is shielded to reduce noise emission.

 

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Chambers Include

  • Trapezoid walls in a non-reflective finish, to keep the animals focus on the screen and reducing distraction away from the screen. 
  • Ultra-sensitive Touch Screen to consistently detect a mouse nose-poke to the touchscreen. Commercially available touchscreens are not sensitive enough to reliably detect every nosepoke.
  • A reward trough that can be place opposite or in front of the screen. While most tasks require the reward trough to be opposite the screen, some tasks (e.g. Autoshaping) require the reward in front of the screen.
  • Pellet or Liquid reward.
  • Activity beams to detect when the animal is at the back or front of the chamber. 
  • House and IR lighting
  • Core Intelli-interface

​Designed to be ‘plug n play’ and highly productive.

  • Chambers installed on our Easy Install System, ready to wheel in your lab. Attach the PC and you are ready to go.
  • Fully validated ready written Task Suites which come with training paradigms and testing guidance.
  • ABET Cognition Software gives you programming power, data analysis, versatility, and flexibility; video and audio control also included.
  • Virtual Interface enables the user to easily write their own scheduling and assess the data away from the lab.
  • On-line training to get your lab quickly working with high productivity.

Easy Install System
Easy Install System


Paradigms

Mouse 5CSRT task

The Bussey-Saksida chamber allows usage of standard, original, and customized paradigms. Standard Task Paradigms are available by arrangement with the University of Cambridge. Standard tasks include popular Tasks such as PD, PAL, 5CSRT, PRC, Location Discrimination, and many more. The rodent tasks range from simple to complex and are virtually identical to tasks used with NHP & human populations on the CANTAB system. All paradigms include training routines as well as the main experimental paradigm and the data analysis sets.

 

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NHP/Human CANTAB Equivalent Standard Tasks Typical time to reach baseline Example neural systems involved Clinical area showing impairment
NHP Pretraining to touch an image and initiate a trial (All task except Auto and 5CSRT) 1-2 weeks (e.g., 7-8 week old C57BL6J mice: 5 days)   Learning
Human/NHP Pairwise / Visual Discrimination (PD) and Reversal Learning Pretraining + 5-7 sessions test to reach base line Prefrontal Cortex, Perirhinal Cortex, Anterior Cingulate, Posterior Cingulate, Medial Frontal Cortex, Striatum, Dopamine system, Cholinergic system, NMDA receptors. Mediodorsal Nucleus of the Thalamus Huntington's, Schizophrenia, Parkinson's, Learning, Cognitive Flexibility, Executive Function.
Human/NHP Paired-Associate Learning Task for Rodents (PAL) Pretraining + 35-45 sessions to 70% Hippocampus, Cholinergic system, NMDA Receptors, AMPA Receptors Alzheimer's, Schizophrenia, Spacial Memory
NHP Visuomotor Conditional Learning for Rodents (VMCL) Pretraining + Approximately 20 sessions Dorsal Striatum, Posterior Cingulate Cortex Huntington's, Parkinson's
Human/NHP 5-choice Serial Reaction Time Task for Rodents (5CSRT) Pretraining (ave 10 sessions) + 3 weeks to 80% @ 2 sec baseline Prefrontal Cortex, Basal Forebrain, Cholinergic (Accuracy), Serotonin (Impulsivity), Noradrenaline (Distraction), Dopamine (Motivation) Alzheimer's, Depression, Huntington's, Schizophrenia, ADHD, OCD
  Autoshaping for Rodents (Auto) Several sessions (no pretraining required) Ventral Striatum, Amygdala, Anterior Cingulate Cortex, Nucleus Accumbens Dopamine, Pedunculopontine Tegmental Nucleus, D1 and NMDA receptors Huntington's
Human/NHP Trial-unique Nonmatching-to-Location Task for Rodents (TUNL) Pretraining + 6-24 Sessions to acquire the basic task Hippocampus, Cholinergic system, NMDA Receptors, Prefrontal Cortex Alzheimer's, Schizophrenia
NHP Location Discrimination for Rodents (LD) Pretraining + 10-20 sessions Hippocampus, Neurogenesis Alzheimer's, Schizophrenia
NHP Extinction for Rodents (EXT) Approximately 4 sessions training + a sessions days extinction Infralimbic Cortex, Striatum and Amygdala ADHD, OCD
Human 5-Choice Continuous Performance Test for Rodents (5C-CPT) Approximately 13 sessions (based on training in 5-hole box) after training to 5-CSRTT Dopamine, Serotonin, Cholinergic, Parietal, Muscarinic. Schizophrenia, ADHD, OCD, Alzheimer's
NHP Progressive Ratio and Effort Related Choice Task for Rodents (PR/ERC) 16 sessions from first habituation to reach stable PR performance Dopamine Motivation, Decision Making
Human 4-Choice Gambling Task for Rodents (4C-GT) Pretraining + 4 sessions familiarizing with choices available, then 13 sessions testing Dopamine, Serotonin Bipolar Disorder, Gambling, Depression, OCD, ADHD, Parkinson's, Schizophrenia, Impulsivity
Human/NHP Rodent Continuous Performance Task: Image for Rodents (rCPT) Pretraining + Approximately 30 sessions Cholinergic system, Anterior Cingulate Cortex Schizophrenia, ADHD, OCD, Alzheimer's
Human Delay Discounting for Rodents (DD) Pretraining + approximately 13 sessions Dopamine Impulsivity, ADHD
NHP Probabilistic Reversal Learning for Rodents (PRL) Pretraining + Approximately 17 sessions Serotonin Depression


Features

  • Write your own Tasks or use the 14 pre-written validated Tasks currently available, including all training paradigms as a turn-key solution.
  • Easier animal handling with side or top loading as standard.
  • Door with magnetic catches for quiet operation.
  • Lower cost and more robust construction.
  • Walls now in a lighter color that provides better contrast for the camera to capture the animal’s image or contour when tracking.
  • Reward trough has a ‘pellet retrieval’ and dual liquid feed options plus a wider aperture to accommodate head-staged animals. Two alternative front plates offering different aperture heights as standard.
  • Modular design to minimize reconfiguration to accommodate tethered animals and/or electrophysiology recording.
  • The chamber floor is now matted to reduced glare from the house-light, again for better consistent image capture by a camera for observation or tracking. 
  • Easier access to remove the floor for cleaning.
  • These new non-reflective walls and floors will aid video tracking, for those customers seeking the extra information this can provide.
  • IR and ambient lighting located under the chamber lid provide even lighting of the chamber whilst eliminating glare from the lid interfering with the camera picture.
  • For Integration with electrophysiology, all contact points between animal and chamber (floor, reward trough etc) have optional electrical isolation coating to prevent movement artefacts occurring. 
  • IR tracking beams now have an instant test facility as well as improved sensitivity and longevity
  • Optional square modular walls to add levers and other modules if required.
  • Slotted lids for tethered animals.
  • Shockable floor
  • Integration with other measures such as Optogenetics, Photometry, Video Tracking and Electrophysiology Recording.
  • Third party systems can be integrated with TTL input and output lines, with low e.m.c. noise 80614EA chambers for integrating with Electrophysiology Recording

Specifications

Animal Working Area

  • 46mm Wide at Feeder, 
  • 238mm Wide at Screen x 170mm Deep (241.4 Sq. cm or 37.5 Sq. in)
  • Working Area is 230mm in Height

Standard Environmental Cabinet

  • Attenuation: Approx. 35dB
  • Weight: 38 kg (empty)
  • External Dimensions: 600mm Wide x 670mm Tall x 352mm Deep
  • Internal Dimensions: 540mm Wide x 610mm Tall x 532mm Deep

Science

The Touch Screen has been used to develop a wide range of tasks, probing different areas of cognition, most of which are available ready written with programs and information to train the rodents to the task.

The design of the Touch Screen chamber and the tasks were both found to be crucial to get good and consistent results - comparable results have been achieved by labs all over the world using the Lafayette/Campden Touch Screen and these prewritten tasks. Implementation of the smooth trapeziodal walls and extra sensitive Touch Screens significantly reduced the training times and rodent performance – minimizing distraction and making sure all nosepokes to the screen are detected.

As well as being able to compare results with other rodent Touch Screen work, the chambers also lend themselves to comparing with both NHP and Human Touch Screen Tasks.

View our webinar on Using Touchscreen Operant Systems to Study Cognitive Behaviors in Rodents

Translational Science

Translational Science

Human CANTAB was developed at Cambridge University, UK, from well-known animal models of behaviour.  This has allowed the development of a range of cognitive tests proven to be sensitive to specific regions of the brain. These language free Human CANTAB tests have been further developed to make them suitable for monkey studies - incorporating as few changes as possible. 

Monkey CANTAB was developed by a group including Drs T.W. Robbins and A.C. Roberts at the Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Cambridge, England, to improve the comparative assessment from animals to humans. The result is a battery of tests that can be used to study cognition in both experimental primates in the laboratory and humans in the clinic.  Link to Monkey CANTAB Page 

Professors Tim Bussey and Lisa Saksida at the Cognitive Systems Neuroscience Laboratory, University of Cambridge, England have also developed rodent touchscreen chambers and tasks for rats and mice to again find tasks that are translational to human cognitive tests. 

An important consideration in the development translational tasks has been to maximise the likelihood that the same cognitive abilities are used by both animals and humans to perform each test. Consequently, complex tasks are broken down into their constituent elements and each element assessed independently of the next in a step-by-step progression through the test. Guiding a subject through the test in this way restricts the use of alternative strategies and permits an analysis of performance in terms of the cognitive components involved. Functional equivalence is suggested if the pattern of performance of animals and humans, at each stage of the test, is qualitatively similar and if comparable impairments are seen following damage to selective brain structures. A growing bibliography is building evidence that this is the case. 

Key Paper - Touchscreen cognitive testing: Cross-species translation and co-clinical trials in neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric disease, Palmer et al, Neurobiology of Learning and Memory, 2021, 107443

One case in point concerns the Paired Associate Learning Task (PAL). In human studies early onset Alzheimer’s patients have shown significant deficiencies on this task. Humans with a DLG2 mutation have been found to be impaired on PAL. Likewise DLG2 knock out mice show impairment as shown here. [Nithianantharajah et al, Nature Neuroscience, 2013, 16

Several strains of rats and mice have been used in the touchscreen chambers, including transgenic and knock out animals. 

In a Lab Animal Review article it is also argued that the translational nature the tasks, the lack of aversive stimuli and the wide range of psychological constructs that can be evaluated, means the touchscreen method can yield significant 3Rs (Replacement, Reduction and Refinement) benefits.

Accessories

Required Accessories

Precision Pellet Dispenser for 45mg Pellets
Precision Pellet Dispenser for 45mg Pellets
Model 80209A-45

Precision food dispenser with dispensing wheel that accommodates 14mg pellets.

ABET Cognition Software
ABET Cognition Software
Model 89515

From writing schedules to analyzing data, ABET Cognition gives you the powerful and flexible tools necessary to control a network of touch screen chamber systems.

Precision Liquid Feed Pump
Precision Liquid Feed Pump
Model 80204A

The rate of flow for the Precision Liquid Feed Pump is been calibrated to give precise delivery of liquids at delivery rates suitable for rewarding mouse, rat, and primate.

Optional Accessories

Delay Discounting Task (DD) for Mice
Delay Discounting Task (DD) for Mice
Model 89552A

Adapted for mice. As a measure of impulsivity, the Delay Discounting Task (DD) measures how long the rodent is prepared to wait for a larger reward.

Extinction (EXT) for Mice
Extinction (EXT) for Mice
Model 89547A

Adapted for mice, this is a simple, but powerful, test of behavioral inhibition.

Probabilistic Reversal Learning (PRL) for Mice
Probabilistic Reversal Learning (PRL) for Mice
Model 89553A

Adapted for mice. Designed to measure sensitivity to valence feedback information, PRL is sensitive to serotonergic manipulations, suggesting this test may be used to study depression-relevant behavior.

4-Choice Gambling Task (4C-GT) for Mice
4-Choice Gambling Task (4C-GT) for Mice
Model 89550A

Adapted for mice, this test is based on the Iowa Gambling Task, sensitive to serotonergic and dopaminergic agents.

Open Reward Trough for Mice with Large Head-stages
Open Reward Trough for Mice with Large Head-stages
Model 80614A-07-10

Designed to fit the trapezoid walls of the Bussey-Saksida touch screen chamber, this alternative reward trough allows mice to take liquid reward without having to nosepoke into the reward trough.

Two-choice Paired/Visual Discrimination Reversal (PD) for Mice
Two-choice Paired/Visual Discrimination Reversal (PD) for Mice
Model 89540A

Adapted for mice, this reversal learning task requires inhibition of prepotent responses and is known to be dependent on the prefrontal cortex.

Paired-Associate Learning Task (PAL) for Mice
Paired-Associate Learning Task (PAL) for Mice
Model 89541A

Adapted for mice, this is a hippocampal task. In humans, this task has proved to be highly effective for the early detection of Alzheimer's disease.

Visuomotor Conditional Learning (VMCL) for Mice
Visuomotor Conditional Learning (VMCL) for Mice
Model 89542A

Adapted for mice, this is a habit or stimulus-response task in which the rodent learns a conditional rule.

5-choice Serial Reaction Time Task (5CSRT) for Mice
5-choice Serial Reaction Time Task (5CSRT) for Mice
Model 89543A

Adapted for mice, this task is sensitive to cortical manipulations, especially those involving prefrontal cortex, and is highly dependent on cholinergic transmission.

Progressive Ratio and Effort Related Choice Task (PR/ERC) for Mice
Progressive Ratio and Effort Related Choice Task (PR/ERC) for Mice
Model 89549A

Adapted for mice, this touch screen task has been shown equivalent to those performed with levers or nose-poke holes in measuring motivation and reward-related decision making.

Rodent Continuous Performance Task: Image (rCPT) for Mice
Rodent Continuous Performance Task: Image (rCPT) for Mice
Model 89551A

Adapted for mice. In this Rodent CPT (Image) task, 5 different images are shown briefly, one at a time and in a random order. One of the images is designated the target stimulus. In order to obtain reward, the subject must touch the target stimulus and withhold from touching the non-target stimuli.

Liquid Reward Trough for Mouse Touch Screen Chamber
Liquid Reward Trough for Mouse Touch Screen Chamber
Model 80614A-07-01

Reward trough for liquid feed/reward.

Trial-unique Nonmatching-to-Location Task (TUNL) for Mice
Trial-unique Nonmatching-to-Location Task (TUNL) for Mice
Model 89545A

Adapted for mice, this is a working memory task. TUNL is a delayed nonmatching-to-place task that prevents the mediating strategies associated with the equivalent lever task.

Location Discrimination (LD) for Mice
Location Discrimination (LD) for Mice
Model 89546A

Adapted for mice, this is a spatial memory task with a reversal learning component. It is sensitive to hippocampal lesions and associated with glutamate receptor regulation and signaling.

Autoshaping (Auto) for Mice
Autoshaping (Auto) for Mice
Model 89544A

Adapted for mice, this task measures a Pavlovian response to the screen. This is a very rapidly administered test of simple classical conditioning that is dependent on a reward system centered on the ventral striatum.

5-Choice Continuous Performance Test (5C-CPT) for Mice
5-Choice Continuous Performance Test (5C-CPT) for Mice
Model 89548A

Adapted for mice, this go/no-go task measures both attentional and inhibitory systems within a single task paradigm, enabling the assessment of vigilance.

Reward Trough for Mouse Touch Screen Chamber with Electrical Isolation
Reward Trough for Mouse Touch Screen Chamber with Electrical Isolation
Model 80614A-07-03

Reward Trough for liquid feed using electronics with reduced electromagnetic emission and electrical isolation coating for better integration with electrophysiology recording.

Related Products

Second Generation Bussey-Saksida Touch Screen Chamber for Rats
Second Generation Bussey-Saksida Touch Screen Chamber for Rats
Model 80604A

The Second Generation Bussey Chambers with Intelli-interface supports up to 20 chambers on one PC. On the strength of 10 years of feedback and development, the system is even more flexible and with more features.

Easy-Install System for Touch Screen Systems
Easy-Install System for Touch Screen Systems
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The Easy-install was developed for the Bussey-Saksida Touch Screen Systems due to the large number of cables and connections that these systems require.

ABET Core Intelli-Interface for Easy Multi-Chamber Control
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