Scientists have built tiny virtual reality glasses for mice

Humans aren’t the only ones getting into the VR craze. Scientists have just released a new technology that allows mice to experience virtual reality in a more realistic and impressive way in the laboratory.

Researchers at Cornell University developed this technology, which they call MouseGoggles. In experiments on mice, the rodents appeared to respond clearly to simulated stimuli while wearing the goggles. This innovation should make it easier for scientists to conduct animal studies involving virtual reality.

Although the idea of ​​virtual reality sounds for rodents is funny, there are actual applications for them. Ideally, virtual reality could allow scientists to simulate the natural environments of mice under more controlled conditions. However, the setup most commonly used today is quite outdated, with mice often placed on a treadmill while surrounded by computer screens or a display. However, these displays cannot cover a mouse’s entire field of vision, and it can take a long time for the animals to interact with the VR environment, if they do so at all.

Researchers at Cornell University believe their MouseGoggles represent a big step forward compared to standard virtual reality mice. Instead of trying to build a small Oculus Rift device from scratch, they built their system using small, low-cost parts borrowed from existing smartwatches and other devices. Like other virtual reality systems, mice are placed on a treadmill to use MouseGoggles. Their heads are fixed on the goggles while they are fed visual stimuli.

“It definitely tapped into the hacker spirit of taking parts designed for something else and then applying them to a new context,” says lead scientist Matthew Isaacson, a postdoctoral researcher at Cornell University. He said Cornell Chronicle, a university news outlet. “The ideal display size, as it turns out, for a VR headset for a mouse, was already made for smartwatches. We were lucky that we didn’t need to build or design anything from scratch, as we could easily get all the cheap parts we needed.

To confirm the feasibility of their system, the researchers exposed mice to different stimuli, measured their brain activity and monitored their behavior. Through a series of tests, the researchers found that the mice seemed to see and respond to virtual reality as hoped. In one case, for example, they tracked how mice reacted to a gradually approaching dark spot that could represent a potential predator.

“When we tried this type of test in a typical VR setup with large screens, the mice didn’t react at all,” Isaacson said. “But almost every mouse, when they first see it with the goggles on, they jump. They have a big startle reaction. They seem to really think they’re being attacked by a looming predator.”

The team’s findings were published Earlier this month in the journal Nature Methods.

Developing a more realistic virtual reality for mice could have all kinds of benefits in the future, researchers say. Precise virtual reality experiences may allow scientists to better map and understand brain activity in mice engineered to develop Alzheimer’s disease, for example, especially areas associated with spatial navigation and memory; It may also improve basic research studies testing potential treatments for brain disorders.

Isaacson and his colleagues are not the only researchers to do this Recently created Virtual reality systems for mice. But they say their device is the first to include eye and pupil tracking. They are already working on developing a lightweight, mobile virtual reality system that could be used with larger rodents such as mice or tree shrews. They also hope to include more upgrades in a future iteration, such as finding a way to mimic taste and smell.