Tales of Two Environments: Enriched Mice show Stronger Sensory Evoked BOLD fMRI Responses, while Socially Isolated Ones Respond Less

Abstract

It is well known environmental factors can affect brain plasticity in humans, yet finding strong correlative factors is difficult due to the long development and complexity of human research. Mouse enrichment studies allows for better controlled research and by combining it with fMRI, makes mapping brain-wide plasticity changes possible. Here, we treated mice into three groups of enrichment, standard caging, and isolated caging to see how their brain responds to multiple-sensory stimulations. We found the enrichment group responded stronger in multimodal midbrain and thalamic areas. The isolated group responded less suggesting mouse fMRI is viable in detecting plasticity changes.