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Senior Design Day

Mouse Hotel

Mouse Hotel

Customer

Dr. Julian P. Meeks – Chemosensation and Social Learning Laboratory

Advisor

Dr. Michael Giacomelli – Associate Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Optics

Project Management

Dr. Scott Seidman – Professor of Biomedical Engineering

Dr. Ben Castañdea – Professor of Biomedical Engineering

Nick Dente – CMTI Master’s Candidate

Team Members

Alexa Trzpis – Biological Signals and Systems

Bailey Nicholoff – Biological Signals and Systems

Darrian Hawryluk – Cell and Tissue Engineering

Yeidi Yuja – Optical Engineering

Zihang Yu – Cell and Tissue Engineering

Project Goals

The goal of this project is to develop a dynamic mouse housing enclosure to study social interactions between mice who can choose to socialize in an open space or seclude in their own rooms. In typical studies, two or more mice are constrained while a single mouse chooses who it wants to interact with. Our design would give all mice autonomy by allowing them to decide whom they wish to interact with, serving stakeholders like behavioral scientists, wildlife researchers, and pharmaceutical developers.

Design

Concept

An acrylic box is divided into a lobby and two hallways leading to individual rooms. When a mouse with a radiofrequency identification (RFID) tag approaches a hallway, a nearby reader checks the tag. If it’s correct and no incorrect tag is detected within 500 ms, the solenoid locks on a flap door unlock, allowing entry. A second identical reader-door system at the end of the hallway prevents other mice from following into the room.

Prototyping

Figure 1: Photographs of the first physical cage prototyping. a) Full-sized standard rat cage divided in half by wall 1, and room divisions shown by wall 3. This set-up is missing wall 2 to complete the double wall enclosure with electronic components. b) ‘inside’ view of wall 1, with a solenoid lock on both sides of the door. c) outside view of wall 1 with some dimension annotations.
Figure 2: Physical power supply and how it is connected to the Arduino, RFID, and RFID tags.
Figure 3: Simplified setup of electronic components of the device in Figure 2.
Figure 4: Device design, depicting 2 individual rooms, a lobby, and the connecting tunnels with RFIDs and locks.
Figure 5: Flowchart of the tag identification system and the door locking mechanism.

Results

From the feedback received during our customer and advisor meetings, the group addressed several changes within the system. We built the acrylic enclosure with minimal gaps and a rectangular design to ensure easy cleaning and lab compliance. Exposed wires were soldered, all 8 solenoids connected to power, and the breadboard was permanently fixed. An internal box houses all the circuitry and tunnels, attached with screws to the larger enclosure for easy removal and modularity. At the moment, we have four functional doors and RFID readers. The system logic allows only one door to open at a time with a valid RFID tag; incorrect tags result in no door unlocking. This was then tested with a toy mouse with a mounted RFID tag. Feedback focused on improving serial port integration, modular reader connections, wire concealment, and cleaning considerations. We have addressed these with clearer logic, a cleaner design, and the potential for future upgrades.

Future Directions

Our current system uses MFRC-552 RFID readers with wearable tags, while the future system will implement Trovan readers with implantable microchips. Planned additions include expanding beyond two rooms to accommodate more mice, adding door automation for convenience, and obtaining UCAR approval for live mouse research. It should also be mentioned that this device serves as a proof of concept for our customer, so that he may present it to UCAR for approval for testing and a higher-quality, custom cage.