Improving Translational Value in Rodent Behavior Studies
Speakers: Wendy A. Koss, Ph.D.
Hosted by: Purdue Animal Behavior Core
Description: In vivo rodent behavior studies have been criticized for having poor translation to human disease. This is primarily due to high failure rates in drug discovery research. Reasons could be poor construct, mechanistic or face validity, and inaccurate interpretations of results. The development of rodent behavior cores may help bridge the translational gap by developing new models and by having behavior experts to reduce poor interpretations and ensure validity. Core facilities can also develop standard protocols to be used across institutions and disciplines. Here we will discuss ways to increase the translational value of rodent behavior tasks by discussing the need for standardize protocols and newer tasks, like touchscreen tests that can mimic tests performed by humans and machine learning to identify other behaviors that our current methods are not able to detect.
