Fig. 1.

High-throughput automated setup for voluntary head fixation. a Head-restraining habituation system. Depiction of a mouse inside a transparent PVC tube drinking water from a water spout connected to a water tank (blue box). Narrowing rails on the sides of the tube progressively restrain the head-post (details in Supplementary Fig. 1). There is no latching mechanism for the head-post, hence mice can back out of the tube at any time. The containing box represents a mouse cage with an air-filtering lid and a metal grid for mouse containment (horizontal solid line under the lid) as in standard individually ventilated cages. Over the course of a couple of days, mice routinely self-restrained to drink water. b 3D view of the main dual cage setup (details of all hardware and software components in the Supplementary Material). c Side view of setup and labeling of its main components. d Side view of two setups (training capability of a single setup is four mice/day) housed in a mouse rack. Several setups can be accommodated in the same rack (current capacity: 12 platforms, 48 mice/day, ~12,000 trials/day). All units are in mm. Original technical drawings edited with permission from O’ Hara & Co., Ltd.