Below are some examples of projects conceived, developed and implemented by the TSG in concert with faculty in the Department of Psychology

Food and Liquid Intake Monitoring System

Designed and constructed for Neuroscience Faculty member Dr. James C. Smith, this unit houses and has provisions for 8 rats. This system monitors liquid licking behavior as well as food consumption on a meal-to-meal basis. Food monitoring is achieved with a unique load beam system and is a real time food consumption monitor with a resolution of 10 mg. This information is passed on to an online data collection computer and is later analyzed by software written specifically for this system by Don Donaldson of the TSG.

Computer Controlled Fluid Delivery System

Developed for Neuroscience Faculty member Dr. Robert Contreras to facilitate studying the sense of taste in rats. The system is used to deliver a precise mixture of liquid compounds to the tongue during electrophysiological recording measurements taken from nerves innervating the tongue. Fluids are pumped from 8 syringes to a non-contaminating mixing valve at a controlled rate (usually totaling 50 ul/sec). After mixing, the fluid is brought to a controlled temperature of 0 to 50 degrees Celsius by a Peltier thermoelectric device before delivery to the tongue. The entire process is computer controlled allowing automatic sequencing of temperature, compound, and concentration presentation. The mixing valve and thermoelectric temperature controller were designed and built specifically for this application, while the computer interface micro-stepping motor controllers and pumps were adapted from prior developments in the FSU Neuroscience Program.

Environmental-metabolic chambers were designed and constructed for Neuroscience Faculty member Dr. Michael Rashotte. These chambers are used in the study of metabolic activities and ingestive behavior with pigeons. They include features such as:

* temperature: computer controlled schedule of temperature in the range of 0 to 35 degrees Celsius.
* O2 and CO2 consumption and production to measure amount and type of energy metabolism.
* body temperature monitoring via telemetry measurement every 30 seconds on a 24 hour basis, with resolution on .01 degrees Celsius.
* heart rate and EMG data.
* water and food dispensing systems.
* water and food consumption data.
* online data collection and chamber control computer

The data collected with this system is stored and analyzed with in-house software that was written specifically for this system.