Mouse feeding behavior: ethology, regulatory mechanisms and utility for mutant phenotyping

Ingestive behaviors, feeding and drinking, constitute unconditioned, obliga tory functions that are tightly regulated in the rodent according to demand s of the external and internal milieu. Dependent measures of food intake ha ve been used extensively in rats to infer the identity and function of neur ochemical pathways, which mediate energy balance. A recent interest in appl ication of appetitive measures in mice can be attributed jointly to the dis covery of novel markers of energy balance in genetically obese mice as well as systematic targeting of known feeding regulatory pathways in bioenginee red mutant mice. Accordingly, this review will attempt to provide the reade r interested in behavioral phenotyping of knockout or transgenic mice with information regarding the ethology of mouse eating behavior, known mechanis ms of appetitive regulation and examples of successes and pitfalls encounte red when studying food intake in mutant mice. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V . All rights reserved.