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Related Experiment Video

Updated: May 25, 2026

Assessing Burrowing, Nest Construction, and Hoarding in Mice
08:23

Assessing Burrowing, Nest Construction, and Hoarding in Mice

Published on: January 5, 2012

Assessing burrowing, nest construction, and hoarding in mice.

Robert Deacon1

  • 1Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford. Robert.deacon@psy.ox.ac.uk

Journal of Visualized Experiments : Jove
|January 20, 2012
PubMed
Summary

New mouse assays for Alzheimer's disease (AD) preclinical screening are presented. These assays characterize activities of daily living (ADL) in mice, offering a more relevant preclinical model for AD drug discovery.

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Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Animal Behavior
  • Pharmacology

Background:

  • Deterioration in activities of daily living (ADL) is an early indicator of Alzheimer's disease (AD).
  • Current preclinical screening for AD treatments relies heavily on cognitive tests in rodents, which may not accurately reflect human episodic memory deficits.
  • Rodent memory appears largely non-episodic, limiting the translatability of current screening methods for human AD.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To introduce and validate novel mouse assays for preclinical screening of Alzheimer's disease (AD) treatments.
  • To characterize activities of daily living (ADL) in mice as a more relevant preclinical model for AD.
  • To present three sensitive and well-characterized ADL assays developed at Oxford.

Main Methods:

  • Development and characterization of a burrowing assay, adapted from hoarding paradigms, using various substrates like food pellets, sand, and bedding.
  • Implementation of a simplified nesting protocol with a defined scoring system for nest quality.
  • Establishment of a hoarding paradigm where mice adapt to a 'home base' and access a food source via a tube during specific times.

Main Results:

  • Mice demonstrated burrowing behavior by emptying containers and tubes, irrespective of substrate, indicating digging movements rather than hoarding.
  • The nesting protocol provides a simplified procedure for assessing nest quality.
  • The hoarding paradigm successfully elicited hoarding behavior when mice were habituated to the apparatus and allowed access to the food source nocturnally.

Conclusions:

  • Characterizing mouse activities of daily living (ADL) offers a promising new approach for preclinical screening of Alzheimer's disease (AD) treatments.
  • The presented burrowing, nesting, and hoarding assays are sensitive and well-characterized methods for assessing ADL in mice.
  • These novel assays may provide more relevant preclinical models for developing effective AD therapies compared to traditional cognitive tests.

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