Morris water maze analysis with video processing

Morris water maze (MWM) is a behavioral test used to study spatial learning and memory in laboratory mice and rats. This test, which was found about 35 years ago by Morris (1981, 1984), has a large tank filled with water and a platform inside the tank. The location of this platform is constant throughout the study. The ability of the mice or rats to locate their position depends on the movement of these animals in the maze. During the course of the trial, animals learn to escape from the water by finding the platform in which they are hidden. Because in the MWM test the performance depends on various factors such as learning memory and motor coordination. The characteristics of the training procedures, the characteristics of the aquatic species, (temperature, purity, etc.) The livestock feeding status of the test animals and many other variables affect the performance of the MWM. A direct analysis performed by the investigator will cause a lot of behavioral information loss, so animal performance is recorded through a camera during the experiment as well. In this thesis, MWM test video analysis was performed. The work was done on MATLAB. The location of the maze in the first step of the analysis is determined by a thresholding algorithm. After finding the location of the maze, Region of Interest (ROI) is defined. Next, Mouse location is determined for each video frame by using segmentation of maze. Maze is divided into four sections in order to better analyze the behavior of the Mouse. The orbits are recorded and time spent in each section of mouse to draw. The desired and expected results have been achieved when working on the sample video recording used up to now in the computer environment.