Rat shipping and stress acclimation
Item
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Title
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Rat shipping and stress acclimation
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Identifier
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d_2009_2013:ecd38c9b6bcb:10788
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identifier
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11065
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Creator
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Savastano, Gina,
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Contributor
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Peter Moller
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Date
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2011
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Animal sciences | Behavioral sciences | Acclimation | Animal Transportation | Behavioral Syndromes | Shipping Stress
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Abstract
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Transporting animals between facilities can cause "shipping stress". Tracking shipping stress and acclimation for rats in research is important for animal welfare and science. Fifty-six female Sprague Dawley rats were monitored to determine if frequent handling accelerates or retards acclimation. Acclimation was determined by glucose and corticosterone parameters, body weight and exploratory behavior up to 7 days after shipping. The rats lost 8.5% of their body weight during shipment. No significant differences were noted between the not handled and handled groups on body weight and glucose; however differences were significant by study day and corticosterone. Corticosterone levels reduced significantly four days after arrival to the new facility. There was a handling effect observed for behavioral end points including more time spent in the center of the arena, more contacts with the novel object and more entries to the open arm of the elevated Y maze. For experiments that require the animals to be stable physiologically, the results of this study support a 48-hour acclimation period for body weight to return to that of pre-shipment levels and 72 hours for experiments involving behavioral measures. This study supports previous research that different personality (behavioral syndromes) types react differently to the same situation. Reactive animals may not adapt as quickly or easily to transportation, housing conditions or experimental procedures as their proactive counterparts.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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2009_2013.csv
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degree
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Ph.D.
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Program
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Psychology
