The calm mouse: an animal model of stress reduction

Chronic stress is associated with negative health outcomes and is linked with neuroendocrine changes, deleterious effects on innate and adaptive immunity, and central nervous system neuropathology. Although stress management is commonly advocated clinically, there is insufficient mechanistic underst...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Molecular medicine (Cambridge, Mass.) Mass.), 2012-04, Vol.18 (4), p.606-617
Main Authors: Gurfein, Blake T, Stamm, Andrew W, Bacchetti, Peter, Dallman, Mary F, Nadkarni, Nachiket A, Milush, Jeffrey M, Touma, Chadi, Palme, Rupert, Di Borgo, Charles Pozzo, Fromentin, Gilles, Lown-Hecht, Rachel, Konsman, Jan Pieter, Acree, Michael, Premenko-Lanier, Mary, Darcel, Nicolas, Hecht, Frederick M, Nixon, Douglas F
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agricultural sciences
Animals
Behavior, Animal
Body Composition
Body Weight
Corticosterone - biosynthesis
Disease Models, Animal
Energy Intake
Environment
Influence
Laboratory animals
Life Sciences
Male
Mice
Mice, Inbred BALB C
Models, Animal
Peptide Hormones - blood
Physical Conditioning, Animal
Stress
Stress, Psychological
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Summary:Chronic stress is associated with negative health outcomes and is linked with neuroendocrine changes, deleterious effects on innate and adaptive immunity, and central nervous system neuropathology. Although stress management is commonly advocated clinically, there is insufficient mechanistic understanding of how decreasing stress affects disease pathogenesis. Therefore, we have developed a "calm mouse model" with caging enhancements designed to reduce murine stress. Male BALB/c mice were divided into four groups: control (Cntl), standard caging; calm (Calm), large caging to reduce animal density, a cardboard nest box for shelter, paper nesting material to promote innate nesting behavior, and a polycarbonate tube to mimic tunneling; control exercise (Cntl Ex), standard caging with a running wheel, known to reduce stress; and calm exercise (Calm Ex), calm caging with a running wheel. Calm, Cntl Ex and Calm Ex animals exhibited significantly less corticosterone production than Cntl animals. We also observed changes in spleen mass, and in vitro splenocyte studies demonstrated that Calm Ex animals had innate and adaptive immune responses that were more sensitive to acute handling stress than those in Cntl. Calm animals gained greater body mass than Cntl, although they had similar food intake, and we also observed changes in body composition, using magnetic resonance imaging. Together, our results suggest that the Calm mouse model represents a promising approach to studying the biological effects of stress reduction in the context of health and in conjunction with existing disease models.
ISSN:1076-1551
1528-3658
DOI:10.2119/molmed.2012.00053