Due to effects of anaesthetic on the BOLD signal, or use of toxic anaesthetics, longitudinal preclinical fMRI studies are uncommon, and studies of age-related disease progression show high variability and use large numbers of animals. This study uses a novel anaesthetic protocol in 11 rats to study changes in the BOLD signal with age. A strong, reproducible BOLD response to forepaw stimulation is found between 7 and 12 months old, and at 15 months old the number of active voxels is reduced by half. This shows that the protocol is suitable for longitudinal studies of ageing.
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