They provide the infrastructure and expertise for many labs across Columbia to measure behavior in mice. Anything from Alzheimer's to ALS and Parkinson's disease models are tested in the core lab, where the CatWalk XT stands as its centerpiece.
CatWalk XT is a complete and highly sensitive tool to assess gait and locomotion. Footprints are captured while a rat or mouse voluntarily traverses a glass plate towards a goal box. Dr. Yang and Paul show us how they use this innovative behavioral system.
Mu Yang: "My analogy is that behavioral science is like chicken stock."
"Everybody needs chicken stock, but too often people don't take behavior science seriously and think that is just some kind of trivial component. Whether it's therapeutic development, mechanistic discovery, you're using the behavioral data to tell the story."
Watch the video to take a look into the Behavioral Core Lab at Columbia University!
More info about CatWalk XT"Noldus software is easy for users to pick up with very little behavioral experience."