Recovery of sensorimotor function following sciatic nerve injury across multiple rat strains.

Background: Peripheral nerve injury (PNI) can result in neurodegenerative changes leading to motor, sensory and autonomic dysfunction. Injury to the rat sciatic nerve is used to model pathophysiologic processes following PNI and assess the efficacy of therapeutic interventions. Frequently, temporal changes in the sciatic functional index (SFI), a measure of sensorimotor integration are measured in rats to assess functional recovery following sciatic nerve injury.

Assessment of ultrasonic vocalizations during drug self-administration in rats.

Drug self-administration procedures are commonly used to study behavioral and neurochemical changes associated with human drug abuse, addiction and relapse. Various types of behavioral activity are commonly utilized as measures of drug motivation in animals. However, a crucial component of drug abuse relapse in abstinent cocaine users is "drug craving", which is difficult to model in animals, as it often occurs in the absence of overt behaviors.