Activmeter

Key features

The originality of the ACTIVMETER from Bioseb lies in its ability to quantify 3 parameters of animal behaviour:
• Movement
• Motionless Activity
• Immobility

Among other advantages, this actimeter is characterized by
• Its ease of use
• The fact that the activity measurement can take place in the Home Cage instead of an Open Field
• That the animal, mouse or rat, is unrestrained during the experiment
• And it does not suffer any surgery that might affect is behavor 

Plus, using food and a bottle, activity measurement experiments can be conducted over a very long period of time.

In addition to these features, Bioseb's ACTIVMETER incorporates a very unique benefit by also measuring the activity when the animal walks or hangs under the wire mesh cover grid (especially useful for mice), giving a true idea of the aptitude and ability of the mice to navigate under a wire mesh grid. The assessment of this aptitude might suggest further evaluation of sensorimotor abilities of the model, using classical tests like the rotarod, the grip test, etc.

The operator of the activmeter can define his own immobility standard as well as the thresholds between slow motion and fast motion. During the actimetry experiment, the operator can visualize on the screen the real-time activity type, position and motion, as well as the parameters measured during each sampling period for each animal (mouse or rat).

Domains of application

Bioseb’s new actimeter for rodents (rats and mice) is especially useful for following applications and research fields:
• General phenotyping
• Neurodegenerative diseases
• Myopathy diseases
• Global locomotor activity associated to radio telemetric measurements
• Studies on Circadian rhythms and associated troubles
• Models used to study psychiatric diseases such as STOP null mice showing disorganized activity and hypersensitivity to stressed event
• Recovery on partial SCI models
• And much more...

Measured Parameters

• Immobility time (sleeping or freezing periods), defined with a specific threshold - (In seconds)
• Motionless activity duration (the animal is awake but not moving in the cage, for example while eating or scratching…) - (In seconds)
• Animal movement: distance (given in cm) and duration, possibility to differentiate between slow motion and fast motion duration. Also available when the mice navigate under a wire mesh grid
• Time of Activity and Inactivity States (in seconds), adjustable by thresholds 
• Instant/ Max and Average speed (given in cm/s) of the animal (mouse or rat), calculated using moving period of time
• All parameters can be changed by the operator and the experiment replayed later using different threshold values.
• Export of results as Excel Files
• Heat Map display, with export as JPEG
• Nest Drawing display
• Specific display of data over Circadian Rhythms

Very easy to use software with Only 3 tabs (Settings/ Experiment / Analysis) - Heat Map and Nest Drawing display

Models
BIO-ACTIV2-MMSTActivMeter for Mice including software, homecage, lid and bottle
BIO-ACTIV2-MAdditional ActivMeter for Mice
BIO-ACTIV2-RMSTActivMeter for Rats including software, homecage, lid and bottle
BIO-ACTIV2-RAdditional ActivMeter for Rats
BIO-ACTIV2-RTOMKit to adapt Rat Activmeter to Mice