Activities of Core C ensure critical consistencies in our model of menopause and midlife estrogen treatment as well as uniform measurements of cognitive function across the four Projects to ensure scientific rigor and reproducibility.
Female rodents undergo some of the same processes of reproductive aging as women, including cessation of reproductive cycles and loss of fertility. Rodents differ from humans in that middle-age is characterized by high levels of estrogens that are often maintained for long periods. Therefore, ovariectomy to induce cessation of ovarian function during middle-age has long been a commonly used and accepted preclinical model for menopause and is the model used in our preliminary studies. Core C provides the following services to all 4 Projects:
This aim ensures that performance of all cognitive behavioral testing and data collection are consistent across Projects. The animal models under all four Projects are tested on identical behavioral tasks that are commonly used in rodents to evaluate memory and cognition. These tests include the hippocampal-dependent radial-arm maze to assess spatial memory, the prefrontal cortex-dependent Y-maze alternation task, and the object placement task that is both prefrontal cortex- and hippocampal-dependent. Evaluation of the performance of study animals on these tasks is critical to understand the ability of estradiol to impact the function of brain areas particularly vulnerable to the impact of non-pathological and pathological aging, including Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias.
Mouse radial arm maze in 9714B Hutchison, downtown Tulane campus.
Mouse Y maze and open field in 9714A Hutchison, downtown Tulane campus.
