Home Cage Monitoring in Rodents: A Global Effort

This Open Access volume is the first book on home-cage monitoring (HCM), carefully prepared by an international team of experts to improve the outcome of animal behavior research. It offers essential information for anyone entering the world of continuous monitoring, addressing animal welfare and translatability in animal models. Comprehensively structured, the book guides you from user training through technologies, rodent models, study design, and commercialization to data analysis and sharing.HCM allows for uninterrupted monitoring of rodents during their active phases with a minimum impact on the animals. This enables them to exhibit natural behaviors in a familiar environment. Moreover, continuous monitoring allows us to pick up animal welfare issues that otherwise might have been missed.As such, the present work is an indispensable contribution to the refinement of experimental conditions and animal wellbeing, ultimately enhancing data reproducibility and translational value. Alongside biomedical researchers, veterinarians and animal care personnel, also experts in animal behavior, laboratory animal science, and data science will recognize the value of this instructive and unique guide.

Stefano Gaburro, PhD, specializes in neuropharmacology and digital technologies for laboratory animal care. As Tecniplast's Scientific Director, he advances translational models for human diseases, emphasizing ethical research practices and the 3Rs - replacement, reduction, refinement. A skilled communicator and Cialdini Certified Professional, Stefano leads significant webinars and collaborates globally to enhance animal welfare in scientific settings. His contributions are pivotal in shaping future biomedical research standards.Silvia Mandillo, PhD, graduated in Natural Sciences from Università La Sapienza, Rome, and earned a PhD in Psychology from Tufts University. She is currently a Senior Research Scientist at the Italian National Research Council (CNR), contributing to major international projects on mouse model phenotyping for human diseases. Her research focuses on motor, cognitive, and emotional behaviors in neurodegenerative and psychiatric disorders using automated systems and ethologically based direct observations. She is also active in several training programs, including the Neurobiology Master’s program at Università Sapienza, Rome.