Neurobehavioral testing in mice: Positive control validation studies and historical control data

SOT 2023 -- Assessment of neurobehavioral effects is an important end point in the preclinical safety evaluation of new drugs and chemicals. Sprague Dawley rats are most often used for neurobehavioral phenotyping due to their widespread use in toxicology research. However, mice are emerging as the primary model of choice in biomedical research due to availability of transgenic mice. Hence, use of mice for preclinical neurobehavioral assessment is becoming more important. Compared to rats, mice are more sensitive to handling and stress, which may result in variable behavior data. Hence it is important to create standardized behavior testing procedures in order to ensure reliable and reproducible results. Drugs that historically have shown consistent and specific behavior outcomes were used in this study to validate equipment and test procedures.