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Triggering a Mouse's Happy Memories With Lasers Gives It the Will To Struggle On
the_newsbeagle writes: With optogenetics, scientists can tag neurons with light-responsive proteins, and then trigger those neurons to "turn on" with the pulse of a light. In the latest application, MIT researchers used light to turn on certain neurons in male mice's hippocampi that were associated with a happy memory (coming into contact with female mice!), and then tested whether that artificially activated memory changed the mice's reactions to a stressful situation (being hung by their tails). Mice who got jolted with the happy memory struggled to get free for longer than the control mice. This tail-suspension test was developed to screen potential antidepressant drugs: If a rodent struggles longer before giving up, it's considered less depressed.
Mice with friggin lasers on... their... heads...
Oh, never mind.
(I wanted sharks....)
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
...and the obligatory Onion
How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
The tail suspension test (TST) was developed as a rodent screening test for potential (human) antidepressant drugs. It is based on the assumption that an animal will actively try to escape an aversive (stressful) stimulus. If escape is impossible, the animal will eventually stop trying ("give up"). In the TST a mouse is suspended by the tail so that its body dangles in the air, facing downward. The test lasts for six or more minutes and may be repeated multiple times. Mice initially struggle to face upward and climb to a solid surface. When the animal stops struggling and hangs immobile it is considered to have “given up”. Longer periods of immobility are characteristic of a depressive-like state. The validity of this test stems from the finding that treatment with an antidepressant drug will decrease the time the animal spends immobile.
I imagine if the drug made the mouse more insane (i.e., struggling more against the impossible). Conversely, I imagine if the drug made the mouse smart enough to know it was impossible, it would appear depressed.
Reminds me of a scene in the Bruce Lee film Enter The Dragon where he realizes he finds himself in a trap and just sits down and waits to make his move.
In fact there are relationships, and how these reflect to human models of both behavior and biologically have been studied
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm...
The long history of these techniques helps the other show the validity of their work because it is commonly known how reliable and variable the behavior.
The experiment is interesting in itself, it show that stimulation of the cells associated with a memory as it forms will affect their behavior. Additionally the effect supports the hypothesis on how the stimulation would affect the behavior.
Of course there are still ethical and moral consideration.. There may in fact be other better ways to investigate the same phenomina or it may be more ethical not to do the research at. However it is not fanciful sadism. It is a serious attempt to extend the understand of optigenetics, memory, behavior and depression