Department of Gerontopharmacology, Troponwerke GmbH & Co. KG, Köln, Germany
Neurological dysfunction can be assessed by analysing foot print patterns and walking tracks. As such an analysis is very time consuming, we developed a computer program called FOOTPRINTS to facilitate this analysis. We analysed data from rodents and humans by using the program and conventional manual scoring methods. In order to validate the program, the prints were evaluated manually along with program-aided analysis.
In the first study, the walking patterns of 3-, 14-, and 26-months-old Janvier rats were compared, and in the second the laterality in foot print patterns of C57BL mice were assessed. The third study assessed the print patterns of adult male and female humans*. To obtain the prints, we assessed a number of commercially available food dyes. The rat aging study revealed that the outer toe spread was increased in the 14-month-old rats in comparison to the younger and older rats. The stride width increased age dependently, whereas the stride length decreased. The foot length, the outward rotation angle, and the number of slidings gradually increased with age.
Comparison of left and right feet in mice showed a more pronounced treading for the left feet. The measure area touched' was more accentuated for the left feet. This suggests that C57BL mice might show differential limb use. We used the measures commonly investigated to develop an MS-Windows program (compiler: Borland Pascal for Windows). This program allows the computer-aided analysis of foot print patterns and we expected that it would be considerably quicker than manual scoring methods. Comparison of the data obtained using the program and of the data obtained by manual scoring confirmed that the computer-based analysis gives reliable results. The program saved considerable time: Analysis was performed in 1/8th of the time needed for manual evaluation.
* Experiment ongoing, results will be presented on poster