Hugh M. Marston

TL;DR: Mice carrying a null mutation of the VPAC(2) receptor for VIP and PACAP (Vipr2(-/-)) are incapable of sustaining normal circadian rhythms of rest/activity behavior and the role of intercellular neuropeptidergic signaling in maintenance of circadian function within the SCN is highlighted.

TL;DR: There is a need for a "preclinical MATRICS" to develop a rodent test battery that is appropriate for drug development and outline an approach for translational research.

TL;DR: These studies intimate that the attentional impairment in alpha7-nAChR transgenic mice maybe core to other deficits in cognition.

TL;DR: By increasing the level of task difficulty, the performance of mice was maintained at sufficiently low levels to allow a demonstrable improvement in performance upon nicotine administration, as α7 KO mice are clearly impaired in the acquisition and asymptotic performance of this task, the α7 nAChR may be involved in mediating these effects of nicotine.

TL;DR: The 5C-CPT is demonstrated as a measure of vigilance that is analogous to human CPT studies, and increased RTs with increased attentional load are observed, consistent with human performance in simple RT, choice RT, and CPT tasks.