Zebrafish enclosure for PET imaging: control of the environmental conditions and vital signs ; Habitáculo para peixe zebra para imagens PET: controlo das condições ambientais e de sinais vitais

The zebrafi sh has emerged as an excellent animal model for studies in research in several areas of biomedicine because it has unique characteristics, such as low cost and simplicity of maintenance, short life cycle, sequenced genome, which facilitates its genetic manipulation, and some physiological mechanisms similar to human beings. In preclinical research, it is often necessary to evaluate certain metabolic processes that occur within the animal models under study. For this, molecular and functional imaging techniques are usually used, such as Positron Emission Tomography (PET) . However, this type of medical technique requires the animal to be alive, which, to a certain extent, entails an additional dificulty of morphological imaging systems. In the present work, a zebra sh enclosure was developed to allow the acquisition of PET images in vivo, while monitoring, in real time, the animal's well-being through the analysis of their heart rate. Thus, the zebrafi sh enclosure was designed, developed and built together with vital signs (infrared LED and photodiode) and water temperature (thermistor) monitoring system. Furthermore, the developed system was tested with zebra sh under controlled conditions, and videos of the zebrafi sh were simultaneously acquired once it is visually possible to quantify the heartbeat and operculum using computer vision methods. The range of values obtained by both methods for zebrafi sh heart rate was 80 - 130 bpm, as expected. Moreover, it has also been found that the movement of the operculum makes it challenging to measure the heart rate, but its efect can be attenuated. Thus, the developed system has the particularity of monitoring the water temperature and the zebra fi sh's vital signs, ensuring physiological stability during medical imaging exams. ; O peixe zebra tem vindo a demonstrar ser um excelente modelo animal para a investigação em diversas áreas da biomedicina, uma vez que apresenta características únicas, como o baixo custo, simplicidade de manutenção, curto ciclo de ...