Figure 3.

Experimental design for environment enrichment. (a) Environmental enrichment (EE) was applied from 14 days pre-EAE induction to the end of the protocol. Standard (STD) animals were kept in standard breeding conditions. WAS was applied to half of the animals of each group during the remission phase of EAE. In total, 4 experimental groups were studied: STD, STD+WAS, EE, EE+WAS. (b) Photography of the STD and EE breeding cages (see methods for details). (c) Measure of fecal pellet outputs in the four experimental groups as an index of stress-induced colonic motility (n = 16, n = 21, n = 12 and, n = 12 for STD, STD+WAS, EE, and EE+WAS groups respectively; *P<0.05; ***P<0.001, STD vs. STD+WAS; P<0.0001, EE vs. STD+WAS; ^†††P<0.001, EE+WAS vs. STD+WAS; Kruskall-Wallis test + Dunn’s multiple comparison).