Stretch-attend posture (SAP) occurs during risk assessment and is prevalent in common rodent behavioral tests. Measuring this behavior can enhance behavioral tests. For example, stretch-attend posture is a more sensitive measure of the effects of anxiolytics than traditional spatiotemporal indices. However, quantifying stretch-attend posture using human observers is time consuming, somewhat subjective, and prone to errors. We have developed MATLAB-based software, MATSAP, which is a quick, consistent, and open source program that provides objective automated analysis of stretch-attend posture in rodent behavioral experiments. Unlike human observers, MATSAP is not susceptible to fatigue or subjectivity. We assessed MATSAP performance with videos of male Swiss mice moving in an open field box and in an elevated plus maze. MATSAP reliably detected stretch-attend posture on par with human observers. This freely-available program can be broadly used by biologists and psychologists to accelerate neurological, pharmacological, and behavioral studies.

a b s t r a c tObtaining accurate temperature distributions in living tissue related to hyperthermia skin cancer treatment without using an intruding sensor is a challenge. Here, we report a mathematical model that can accurately determine the temperature distribution in the tumor region and surrounding normal tissue. The model is based on a modified Pennes' equation for the bioheat transfer in a 3-D triple-layered skin structure embedded with a vascular countercurrent network and a tumor appearing in the subcutaneous region. The vascular network is designed based on the constructal theory of multi-scale tree-shaped heat exchangers. The tumor is injected with gold nanoshells in order to be heated quickly. The proposed model is implemented numerically using a stable finite difference scheme. The method is demonstrated and tested by an example.