Rattractor - Instant guidance of a rat into a virtual cage using a deep brain stimulation

Abstract

We developed "Rattractor" (rat attractor), a system to apply electrical stimuli to the deep brain of a rat as it stays in a specified region or a virtual cage to demonstrate an instant electrophysiological feedback controller for animals. Two wire electrodes were implanted in the brains of nine rats. The electrodes targeted the medial forebrain bundle (MFB), which is a part of the reward system in the deep brain. Following the recovery period, the rats were placed in a plain field where they could move freely, but wired to a stimulation circuit. An image sensor installed over the field detected the subjects position, which triggered the stimulator such that the rat remained within the virtual cage. We conducted a behavioral experiment to evaluate the sojourn ratio of rats residing in the region. Thereafter, a histological analysis of the rat brain was performed to confirm the position of the stimulation sites in the brain. Seven rats survived the surgery and the recovery period without technical failures such as connector breaks. We observed that three of them tended to stay in the virtual cage during stimulation, and this effect was maintained for two weeks. Histological analysis revealed that the electrode tips were correctly placed in the MFB region of the rats. The other four subjects showed no apparent preference for the virtual cage. In these rats, we did not find electrode tips in the MFB, or could not determine their positions. Almost half of the rats tended to remain inside the virtual cage when position-related reward stimuli were triggered in the MFB region. Notably, our system did not require previous training or sequential interventions to affect the behavioral preferences of subjects. This process is similar to the situation in which sheep are chased by a shepherd dog in the desired direction.