JPH045340B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Industrial Application Field] The present invention relates to an apparatus for automatically collecting feces and urine over time when performing metabolic experiments or measuring drug efficacy using animals.

[Prior Art] When developing pharmaceuticals, it is necessary to record the excretion patterns of administered materials and biological components from stool and urine in animal experiments.

Conventionally, in this type of experiment, experimental animals were observed and the time course of their defecation and urination was manually collected and recorded. For this reason, it is necessary for personnel to regularly observe the cages housing the experimental animals, but laboratory animals are prone to stress and stimulation when humans approach them, which easily disrupts their natural defecation and urination mechanisms. It was difficult to obtain accurate records of defecation and urination. Therefore, the cycle of stool and urine collection was usually done on a daily basis.

In order to obtain a record of the defecation of experimental animals without the need for humans to approach them, it is desirable to collect stool and urine automatically and over time. Devices that automatically dispose of feces generated when raising livestock etc. are disclosed in, for example, JP-A-54-103246, JP-A-55-48335,
It has been proposed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 56-21519, etc.
All of these devices are intended to dispose of waste feces, and are not intended to automatically collect and record feces and urine on an hourly basis in animal experiments. Nakatsuta.

[Object of the Invention] An object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus that can automatically collect and record feces and urine of laboratory animals on an hourly basis over time.

[Structure of the Invention] A laboratory animal stool/urine collection apparatus according to the present invention includes a paper supply roll, a winding roll, a motor having a timer mechanism for driving the winding roll, and a cage housing a laboratory animal. an endless belt that moves together with the paper roll, and a limit switch that causes the paper roll to be wound in a fixed area at regular intervals by contacting projections formed on the endless belt. There is.

[Operations and Effects of the Invention] According to the present invention, a roll of paper is used as described above, and feces and urine of a laboratory animal are collected using the roll of paper, and a certain area of the roll of paper is collected at regular intervals. Since it is rolled up, the time interval between defecation and urination can be accurately calculated when the roll is rewound and the defecation/urination record is analyzed. In addition, fecal and urine collection is fully automated and can be unattended for long periods of time, allowing experiments to be conducted in a natural environment without causing unnecessary stress or stimulation to experimental animals.

Furthermore, the entire device is compact and highly reliable operation can be achieved. Furthermore, by providing a large number of devices in parallel, a single motor or control device can operate a large number of devices at once, allowing experiments to be performed under the same conditions.

[Preferred Embodiment] When carrying out the present invention, it is preferable to use a protrusion that comes into contact with the limit switch to mark the roll paper from the inkwell, as this makes the time zone of the roll paper more clear after winding. . The material for the wrapping paper may be appropriately selected depending on the type of animal, and a material with high polymer absorption capacity is preferred.
Note that the amount of movement of the web can be adjusted by changing the number of protrusions provided on the endless belt.

[Example] Hereinafter, an example of the present invention will be described using FIGS. 1 to 3.

FIG. 1 shows the overall outline of the device of the present invention, in which a cage 2 is mounted on the base, which is designated by the reference numeral 1 as a whole.
is placed therein, and an experimental animal 3 such as a mouse is housed in the cage 2. The bottom surface 4 of the cage 2 is slatted or grid-like, and the mouse feces 5
is configured to pass through the bottom surface 4 and fall onto the web 6. Further, urine falls like feces and is collected by being absorbed onto the paper roll 6. Two rolls 7 and 8 are rotatably supported on the base 1, and the paper roll 6 rolled out from one roll 7 is wound onto the other roll 8.

The take-up roll 8 is driven by a motor 9,
A timer 10 is attached to this motor 9.
At the entrance portion where the paper roll 6 passes below the cage 2, the paper roll 6 is introduced directly below the cage 2 while being sandwiched between a pair of pinch rollers 11 and 12. The shape of this pinch roller is also shown in FIG. 2, and the paper roll 6 is pinched and fed between an upper stepped roller 11 and a lower cylindrical roller 12. Both sides of the paper roll 6 are supported and guided by guide plates 19 and 20 formed on the side walls of the base 1. The guide plates 19 and 20 prevent feces from falling from the paper roll 6.

A similar cylindrical roller 13 is provided corresponding to the lower pinch roller 12, and a rubber belt 14 is stretched between the rollers 12 and 13. This rubber belt 14 is as shown in FIG. 3, and supports rollers 12 and 13, and has two protrusions 15 and 16 attached to the outer surface of the belt at equal intervals. A limit switch 17 and an ink fountain 18 are arranged below the rubber belt 14, and the projections 15 and 16 engage with the limit switch 17 and the ink fountain 18, respectively.

Next, the operation of this device will be explained.

When a power supply (not shown) is turned on to start the motor 9 and rotate the take-up roll 8 to take up the paper roll 6, the rubber belt 14 also moves in synchronization with the movement of the paper roll 6.

As the rubber belt 14 moves, the protrusions 15,1
6 moves, and one of them engages the limit switch 17. When the limit switch 17 is activated, the motor 9 is stopped and the timer 10 is activated. In other words, the motor 9 is stopped for a certain period of time set by the timer 10 to stop paper winding, and after the certain period of time the motor 9 is started again and the paper continues to be wound until the next protrusion engages the limit switch 17. This is what we do. Therefore, the protrusion 15,1
If the interval between the paper rolls 6 and 6 is set to be equal to or longer than the length of the cage 2, a new sheet of paper can be rolled out on the bottom surface of the cage 2 at regular intervals. Further, when one of the protrusions comes into contact with the ink fountain 18 as the rubber belt 14 moves, ink adheres to the upper surface of the protrusion. As the protrusion moves further and contacts the web, it places an ink mark on the web. Therefore, by unwinding the rolled paper and checking the number of ink marks, it is possible to know how many times the paper has been wound. A similar result can also be obtained by using rolled paper with marks placed in advance at each interval between the protrusions 15 and 16.

[Summary] Since the present invention is configured as described above, the feces and excreta excreted by the experimental animals in the cage fall onto the rolling paper and are wound up at regular intervals. By rewinding the paper later and examining it, it is possible to accurately determine the number and amount of defecation, the number of urinations, and the amount of components in urine over time, making it useful for detailed metabolic experiments using animals and for measuring drug efficacy. Extremely useful.

In addition, since this fecal and urine collection is performed automatically without the use of human hands, a good environment can be maintained without giving unnecessary stimulation to the experimental animals.

In addition, in the present invention, the case where there is one cage has been described, but it is possible to arrange a plurality of cages side by side using a wide roll of paper, or to arrange several cages side by side,
If controlled by the same motor or control device,
Stool and urine collection from a larger number of experimental animals can be performed automatically and over time.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing the entire device of the present invention, and FIG.
The figure is a sectional view of the main part, and FIG. 3 is a side view of the rubber belt section. 1...base, 2...cage, 3...experimental animal,
6... Winding paper, 8... Winding roll, 9...
...Motor, 10...Timer, 12, 13...Roller, 14...Rubber belt, 15, 16...Protrusion, 17...Limit switch, 18...Ink fountain, 19, 20...Guide plate.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. Equipped with a paper roll supply roll, a take-up roll, a motor with a timer mechanism for driving the take-up roll, and an endless belt that moves with the paper roll below the cage containing the experimental animal. 1. A device for collecting feces and urine from laboratory animals, characterized in that it is equipped with a limit switch that allows a protrusion formed on an endless belt to come into contact with the limit switch so that the paper roll is wound in a fixed area at fixed time intervals.