Elsevier

Neurobiology of Aging

Volume 34, Issue 3, March 2013, Pages 731-744
Neurobiology of Aging

Regular article
A touch screen-automated cognitive test battery reveals impaired attention, memory abnormalities, and increased response inhibition in the TgCRND8 mouse model of Alzheimer's disease

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2012.08.006Get rights and content
Under a Creative Commons license
open access

Abstract

Transgenic mouse models of Alzheimer's disease (AD) with abundant β-amyloid develop memory impairments. However, multiple nonmnemonic cognitive domains such as attention and executive control are also compromised early in AD individuals, but have not been routinely assessed in animal models. Here, we assessed the cognitive abilities of TgCRND8 mice—a widely used model of β-amyloid pathology—with a touch screen-based automated test battery. The test battery comprises highly translatable tests of multiple cognitive constructs impaired in human AD, such as memory, attention, and response control, as well as appropriate control tasks. We found that familial AD mutations affect not only memory, but also cause significant alterations of sustained attention and behavioral flexibility. Because changes in attention and response inhibition may affect performance on tests of other cognitive abilities including memory, our findings have important consequences for the assessment of disease mechanisms and therapeutics in animal models of AD. A more comprehensive phenotyping with specialized, multicomponent cognitive test batteries for mice might significantly advance translation from preclinical mouse studies to the clinic.

Keywords

Alzheimer's disease
Mouse models
Attention
Response control
Touchscreen
Memory
Cognition
β-amyloid
TgCRND8

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1

Current address: Max-Planck-Institute for Psychiatry, Munich, Germany.