Comparative Analysis of Test Tube and Volumetric Drinking Monitor Methods in Voluntary Ethanol Consumption in Female Mice for Prenatal Alcohol Exposure

ObjectiveFetal alcohol spectrum disorders affect approximately 1 in 20 school age children in the United States of America. To study fetal alcohol spectrum disorders, mouse models are commonly used. Of the many approaches of gestational exposure, voluntary drinking paradigms represent the most similar mechanism of drinking as human exposure. These exposures can be done through low-tech solutions such as test tubes (TT), or more high-tech methods such as a volumetric drinking monitor (VDM). Here were compare the TT method and the VDM directly, to evaluate their effect on female mouse drinking. MethodWe adapted a drinking in the dark, active cycle, limited access (4 hr.) voluntary drinking paradigm first described by Brady et al. (2012) to test tubes and the volumetric drinking monitor. 8 mice were placed in either drinking method and we evaluated their drinking volume and blood alcohol concentrations (BACs). We compared the values for each group using t-tests. ResultsAfter 2 weeks of drinking 10% ethanol with 0.4% saccharine, BACs were not significantly different [t(14)=0.2681, p=0.7935] between the VDM (81.56 {+/-} 21.16 mg/dL) vs.TT (73.14 {+/-} 23.20 mg/dL) groups. Calculated intake of ethanol (g/kg) on the day of blood draw for BAC analysis was also not significantly different [t(14)=0.4308, p=0.6732] between VDM (2.985 {+/-} 0.4127) vs.TT (3.260 {+/-} 0.4863; Fig 1B) groups. O_FIG O_LINKSMALLFIG WIDTH=139 HEIGHT=200 SRC="FIGDIR/small/658718v1_fig1.gif" ALT="Figure 1"> View larger version (15K): org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@5f3ad4org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@f45edorg.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@b7d7f8org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1c40c63_HPS_FORMAT_FIGEXP M_FIG O_FLOATNOFig 1.C_FLOATNO C_FIG ConclusionsTest tube or VDM resulted in similar average daily ethanol consumption and resultant BACs in female mice