COMPARISON OF ACCELEROD AND ROTAROD SENSITIVITY IN DETECTING ETHANOL-INDUCED AND ACRYLAMIDE-INDUCED PERFORMANCE DECREMENT IN RATS - REVIEW OF EXPERIMENTAL CONSIDERATIONS OF ROTATING ROD SYSTEMS

Abstract

The relative sensitivity of 2 rotating rod techniques in detecting performance decrement in rats was assessed after treatment with ethanol or acrylamide. Performance on the rod during acceleration at .apprx. 1 rpm/sec (accelerod) was compared to that obtained on the same rod operated at a constant speed of 20 rpm (rotarod). Rats trained to either task received a single oral dose of ethanol (0.5, 1.0, 1.5 or 2.0 g/kg) or a series of i.p. doses of acrylamide (25 or 50 mg/kg per day) before testing. Accelerod performance was significantly more disrupted at lower doses and for longer periods of time after ethanol ingestion than was rotarod performance. Task disruption resulting from repeated injections of acrylamide also appeared at lower cumulative doses using the accelerod. A higher proportion of the naive subjects were successfully trained and the mean time for training to minimum performance standards was significantly less using the accelerod. The greater sensitivity of the accelerod technique in detecting neurotoxic effects was attributed primarily to the fact that this test provided a continuous measure of the upper limit of performance rather than the quantal or arbitrarily truncated measure than usually obtained from the rotarod. A review of the primary experimental variables that affected the reliability of data obtained in neurotoxic evaluations using the accelerod and rotarod procedures was presented.