Cages affect mice brain

WASHINGTON - The type of cage that mice are kept in worldwide can profoundly alter their brains and greatly affect the accuracy of research.

“This could explain some of the failures to replicate findings in different laboratories,” said study author Diego Restrepo, professor of cell and developmental biology at the University of Colorado, reports the journal Public Library of Science.

“And why contradictory data are published by different laboratories even when genetically identical mice are used as subjects,” he added.

Specifically, the portion of the mouse’s brain responsible for its keen sense of smell, the olfactory bulb, is altered, according to a University of Colorado statement.

Mice are the chief research mammals in the world today with some of the most promising cancer, genetic and neuroscience breakthroughs riding on the rodents.

Restrepo also found profound changes in the levels of aggression when mice are moved from one type of cage to another.

The consequences could mean good science derailed or promising research abandoned simply due to the design of a mouse cage - something largely overlooked until now.