The Wmicrotracker ARENA detects the activity of small animals as soon as they move within an infrared microbeam array. It’s crucial to consider the number of organisms to avoid saturation of detection, which leads to a loss of sensitivity. In this context, a linear zone with a plateau is expected as the number of organisms increases.
As indicated below for ARENA, the saturation level (the number of worms at which the system loses sensitivity) exceeds 300 in W6 plates and 100 in 24-well plates. It’s important to note that these curves are specific to each animal model and stage. If you intend to implement a new animal model, you should create your own linearity curves.
Here, we present two representative curves for adult C. elegans cultured on NGM:
Curve 6W Microplate: Young Adult_N2 (C.elegans)_NGM
The system presents a very good linearity of detection between 10 and 300 worms, observing a plateau at more than 300 (R2=0.99).
Curve 24W Microplate: Young Adult_N2 (C.elegans)_NGM
The system presents very good linearity of detection between 5 and 100 worms (R2=0.96), observing a decrease at more than 100 worms.
NOTE: These results were obtained using NGM plates, no seeded bacteria. Worms’ locomotor activity changes in presence of food.