Assessing Healthspan and LifespanMeasures in Aging Mice: Optimization ofTesting Protocols, Replicability, and RaterReliability

摘要

The relationship between chronological age (lifespan) and biological age(healthspan) varies amongst individuals. Understanding the normal trajectoryand characteristic traits of aging mice throughout their lifespan is important forselecting the most reliable and reproducible measures to test hypotheses. Theprotocols herein describe assays used for aging studies at The Jackson Laboratory’sMouse Neurobehavioral Phenotyping Facility and include assessmentsof frailty, cognition, and sensory (hearing, vision, olfaction), motor, and finemotor function that can be used for assessing phenotypes in aged mice acrosstheir lifespan as well as provide guidance for setting up and validating thesebehavioral measures. Researchers aiming to study aging phenotypes requireaccess to aged mice as a reference when initiating these types of studies inorder to observe normal aging characteristics that cannot be observed in youngadult mouse populations.