Low-cost open hardware system for behavioural experiments simultaneously with electrophysiological recordings

Leandro A A Aguiar; Nivaldo A P de Vasconcelos; Gabriela Chiuffa Tunes; Antonio J Fontenele; Romildo de Albuquerque Nogueira; Marcelo Bussotti Reyes; Pedro V Carelli

doi:10.1016/j.ohx.2020.e00132

Low-cost open hardware system for behavioural experiments simultaneously with electrophysiological recordings

HardwareX. 2020 Aug 11:8:e00132. doi: 10.1016/j.ohx.2020.e00132. eCollection 2020 Oct.

Authors

Leandro A A Aguiar^{1

2

3}, Nivaldo A P de Vasconcelos^{2

4

5

6}, Gabriela Chiuffa Tunes⁷, Antonio J Fontenele², Romildo de Albuquerque Nogueira¹, Marcelo Bussotti Reyes⁷, Pedro V Carelli²

Affiliations

¹ Departamento de Morfologia e Fisiologia Animal, Universidade Federal Rural de Pernambuco, Recife, PE 52171-900, Brazil.
² Physics Department, Federal University of Pernambuco, Recife, PE 50670-901, Brazil.
³ Departamenteo de Ciências Fundamentais e Sociais, Universidade Federal da Paraíba, Areia, PB, Brazil.
⁴ Department of Biomedical Engineering, Federal University of Pernambuco, Recife, PE 50670-901, Brazil.
⁵ Life and Health Sciences Research Institute (ICVS), School of Medicine, University of Minho, Braga 4710-057, Portugal.
⁶ ICVS/3B's - PT Government Associate Laboratory, Braga/Guimarães 4806-909, Portugal.
⁷ Center for Mathematics, Computing and Cognition, Universidade Federal do ABC, Santo André, SP 09210-580, Brazil.

Abstract

A major frontier in neuroscience is to find neural correlates of perception, learning, decision making, and a variety of other types of behavior. In the last decades, modern devices allow simultaneous recordings of different operant responses and the electrical activity of large neuronal populations. However, the commercially available instruments for studying operant conditioning are expensive, and the design of low-cost chambers has emerged as an appealing alternative to resource-limited laboratories engaged in animal behavior. In this article, we provide a full description of a platform that records the operant behavior and synchronizes it with the electrophysiological activity. The programming of this platform is open source, flexible, and adaptable to a wide range of operant conditioning tasks. We also show results of operant conditioning experiments with freely moving rats with simultaneous electrophysiological recordings.

Keywords: Local field potential; Open behavior; Operant conditioning; Reaction time; Spikes.