How much exercise should rats get? - briefly
Rats should receive daily aerobic activity, such as 30–60 minutes of moderate wheel running, five days a week. This schedule enhances cardiovascular health, muscle tone, and behavioral performance while minimizing stress.
How much exercise should rats get? - in detail
Rats require regular physical activity to maintain cardiovascular health, muscle tone, and behavioral stability. Research using running wheels, treadmills, and open‑field arenas provides quantitative guidance for various experimental conditions.
Adult laboratory rats (8–12 weeks old) typically achieve a daily voluntary wheel running distance of 3–5 km when wheels are available 24 hours per day. When wheel access is limited to 2–4 hours, total distance drops to 0.5–1.5 km. Forced treadmill protocols commonly employ speeds of 10–15 m min⁻¹ for 30–60 minutes, five days per week, yielding a workload comparable to moderate human exercise.
Juvenile rats (3–4 weeks) display lower endurance. Voluntary wheel running averages 1–2 km per day, while treadmill sessions should not exceed 20 m min⁻¹ for 20 minutes to avoid stress‑induced metabolic disturbances.
Strain differences influence activity levels. Sprague‑Dawley and Wistar rats tend to run longer distances than Long‑Evans or Fischer 344 strains. Adjustments of duration and intensity are recommended when working with less active strains.
Guidelines for experimental design:
- Provide unrestricted wheel access for baseline studies of natural activity patterns.
- For controlled intensity, implement treadmill sessions at 12 m min⁻¹, 45 minutes, five times weekly.
- Limit forced exercise in young animals to 20 minutes, 10 m min⁻¹, no more than three sessions per week.
- Monitor body weight, cortisol levels, and locomotor behavior to detect overtraining.
- Record individual daily distances when using wheels to ensure consistency across subjects.
These parameters balance physiological benefits with the risk of stress, supporting reproducible outcomes in rat research.