Mouse Behavioral Phenotyping Core

Aerial view of Charleston

The MUSC Mouse Behavioral Phenotyping Core provides both MUSC investigators and other external investigators the equipment, expertise, service and training for testing a range of common mouse behaviors. The core provides a range of behavior testing services to study neurological disorders, such as Autism Spectrum Disorder, intellectual disability, anxiety/depression, and Alzheimer’s Disease. The core performs behavioral testing, data analysis, and data interpretation to interested investigators on a fee-for-service basis. In addition, the core offers personnel training for investigator to have access to the behavior equipment if they prefer to test the mice themselves. Overall, the core provides necessary equipment and expertise to correlate behavioral outcomes of treatments/genetic modifications to cellular/molecular changes of the variants that are observed in their independent labs.

Harrington, A. J., Bridges, C. M., Berto, S., Blankenship, K., Cho, J. Y., Assali, A., Siemsen, B. M., Moore, H. W., Tsvetkov, E., Thielking, A., Konopka, G., Everman, D. B., Scofield, M. D., Skinner, S. A., & Cowan, C. W. (2020). MEF2C Hypofunction in Neuronal and Neuroimmune Populations Produces MEF2C Haploinsufficiency Syndrome-like Behaviors in Mice. Biological psychiatry, 88(6), 488–499. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2020.03.011

Penrod, R. D., Kumar, J., Smith, L. N., McCalley, D., Nentwig, T. B., Hughes, B. W., Barry, G. M., Glover, K., Taniguchi, M., & Cowan, C. W. (2019). Activity-regulated cytoskeleton-associated protein (Arc/Arg3.1) regulates anxiety- and novelty-related behaviors. Genes, brain, and behavior, 18(7), e12561. https://doi.org/10.1111/gbb.12561

Taniguchi, M., Carreira, M. B., Cooper, Y. A., Bobadilla, A. C., Heinsbroek, J. A., Koike, N., Larson, E. B., Balmuth, E. A., Hughes, B. W., Penrod, R. D., Kumar, J., Smith, L. N., Guzman, D., Takahashi, J. S., Kim, T. K., Kalivas, P. W., Self, D. W., Lin, Y., & Cowan, C. W. (2017). HDAC5 and Its Target Gene, Npas4, Function in the Nucleus Accumbens to Regulate Cocaine-Conditioned Behaviors. Neuron, 96(1), 130–144.e6. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuron.2017.09.015

Harrington, A. J., Raissi, A., Rajkovich, K., Berto, S., Kumar, J., Molinaro, G., Raduazzo, J., Guo, Y., Loerwald, K., Konopka, G., Huber, K. M., & Cowan, C. W. (2016). MEF2C regulates cortical inhibitory and excitatory synapses and behaviors relevant to neurodevelopmental disorders. eLife, 5, e20059. https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.20059