ANY-maze Help > I/O devices supported by ANY-maze > Test equipment designed specifically for ANY-maze > The Waterwheel Forced Swim Test Tank > An introduction to the Waterwheel Forced Swim Test

An introduction to the Waterwheel Forced Swim Test

Introduction

The Waterwheel Forced Swim Test (Waterwheel Forced Swim Test) consists of a transparent water tank with a 3.5cm diameter waterwheel positioned across its centre; the wheel has six 0.5cm paddles evenly positioned on its surface (see figure 1).

Figure 1. The Waterwheel Forced Swim Test tank

Animals placed in the tank will attempt to escape by climbing onto the wheel, however this just causes the wheel to turn - thus, the number of turns of the wheel provides an objective measure of 'escape behaviour', eliminating the subjectivity of immobility measurements.

This method was originally described by Nomura et al. in their paper A new behavioural test for antidepressant drugs (European Journal of Pharmacology, 83 (1982) 171-175), where the authors also reported that the Waterwheel FST could distinguish antidepressant drugs from other drugs such as tranquillizers, anticholinergics and antihistamines, something the Porsolt test is unable to do. The abstract of their paper is quoted below:

In 1977 Porsolt proposed a new behavioural test, using mice, for screening antidepressants. He stated that antidepressants selectively reduce the immobility of mice in a forced swimming situation. The test is useful, but lacks objectivity in its evaluation of immobility and does not successfully screen 'false positive' drugs. A new 'behavioural despair' test was thus designed involving a small water wheel set in a water tank. Mice placed on this apparatus turned the wheel vigorously but, when they abandoned attempts to escape from the water the wheel stopped turning. The number of rotations of the water wheel were counted. All antidepressants tested increased the number of rotations. However, tranquillizers, anticholinergics and antihistaminics were not effective. We suggest that this water wheel test is more appropriate as screening test for antidepressants than Porsolt's test with regard to both objectivity and specificity.

As well as the waterwheel, the Waterwheel Forced Swim Test tank includes a temperature sensor, which measures the water temperature; a test control button, which can be used to start, pause or end tests; and an LED, which indicates the current test status. The device connects directly to a PC via a USB cable, and is fully integrated into ANY-maze.

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ANY-maze help topic T1222