Mouse Rave!
Scientists who blasted drugged mice with loud music in an experiment described by the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection as “tasteless and horrific” have received an official Home Office reprimand, a year after the results of the study were published in the Journal NeuroReport. The Experiments on 238 mice at Cambridge University, led by Dr Jenny Morton, were a by-product of research into Huntingdon’s Disease.
Half the mice were injected with methamphetamine and half with salt water. They were then exposed to silence, white noise, or loud music – either the dance act The Prodigy or Bach’s Violin Concerto in A Minor, which have a similar tempo. Mice Injected with salt fell asleep when the music was played, but the sound dramatically affected the drugged mice, causing them to suffer more speed-induced brain damage than normal. Seven died listening to The Prodigy and four while listening to Bach. They appeared to “jiggle backwards and forwards” as the music pounded in their ears.
Scotsman, Irish Times, Daily Telegraph, 19 August 2002 / Fortean Times December 2002.
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