An inexpensive and automated method for presenting olfactory or tactile stimuli to rats in a two-choice discrimination task.

摘要: An inexpensive and automated method for presentation of olfactory or tactile stimuli in a two-choice task rats was implemented with the use computer-controlled bidirectional motor. The motor rotated disk that presented two different texture discrimination, odor discrimination. Because solid were placed outside chamber metal pods mesh at front sampling, “washout” odors between trials not necessary. To avoid differential auditory cues from rotation, arranged such on each trial always exactly one quarter revolution (in 1 s), left right, to present next stimulus start. illustrate equipment, 2 trained discrimination sampled through port back wall by sniffing it (olfactory) touching (tactile). go-left/go-right being discriminative which lever provided reinforcement. reached stable level above 90% correct after 21 32 training sessions respectively. article outlines how equipment constructed low-cost components. Inputs outputs parallel personal computer without commercial interface board. should be variety experimental situations as matching-to-sample cross-modal