International Mammalian Genome Society

17th International Mouse Genome Conference

9-12 November 2003, Braunschweig, Germany

Plenary Presentations * Oral Presentations *
Poster Presentations: Behavioural Genetics and Genomics * Development and Stem Cells * Functional Genome Analysis * Mouse Models of Human Disease * Mouse System Biology Bioinformatics * Multigenic and Multifactorial Trait Analysis * Nutrition and Metabolic Disease * Phenotyping Methods Imaging * The Genetics and Genomics of Infectious Disease *
Verne Chapman Memorial Lecture * Table of Contents * Sponsor/Exhibitor List * Awards * Photographs

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POSTER 2 - BEHAVIOURAL CHARACTERISATION OF WILD DERIVED MALE MICE (MUS MUSCULUS) OF THE PWD/Ph INBRED STRAIN

Fernandes C
Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London

Co-Authors: 1) Liu L, 1) Paya-Cano JL, 2) Gregorova S, 2) Forejt J, 1) Schalkwyk LC
Institutions: 1)Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London 2)Institute of Molecular Genetics, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic

PWD/Ph is an inbred mouse strain derived from wild mice trapped in central Czech Republic. These mice are of the Mus musculus musculus subspecies, whose ancestors separated from those of Mus musculus domesticus about one million years ago. There is a high degree of sequence polymorphism and variation in diverse phenotypes between PWD/Ph and common inbred mouse strains (Gregorova and Forejt, 2000), genomes of which are 80% or more Mus musculus domesticus origin, making PWD/Ph mice a useful resource for complex trait research. As a first step in taking advantage of this resource, a preliminary characterisation of the behaviour of PWD/Ph mice was performed. Groups of 10 PWD/Ph and C57BL/6J male mice were tested in the open field, novel object exploration task and Morris water maze. PWD/Ph were marginally more anxious than C57BL/6J mice but subsequently displayed higher levels of exploration and lower anxiety than C57BL/6J mice following introduction of a novel object. PWD/Ph and C57BL/6J mice differed in their water escape training profiles in the Morris water maze, perhaps reflecting different motivational factors. However, there were no differences in overall cognitive ability (spatial learning) as both groups learned to find the hidden platform and performed equally well when the location of the platform was changed. This is the first quantification of the behaviour of PWD/Ph mice and the results are promising for the potential of the consomic panel currently being generated with PWD/Ph and C57BL/6J as a tool in the molecular dissection of behaviour. Supported by EC grant (INFRAQTL)