Abstract Significance Cerebral vascular reactivity is critical parameters of brain homeostasis in health and disease, but the investigational value of brain oxymetry is diminished by anesthesia and mechanical fixation of the mouse scull. Aim We needed to reduce the physical restrictivity of hemodynamic spectroscopy to enable Alzheimer’s disease (AD) studies in freely-moving mice. Approach We combined spectroscopy, spectral analysis software and a magnetic, implantable device to measure vascular reactivity in unanesthetized, freely-moving mice. We measured cerebral blood volume fraction ( CBVF ) and oxygen saturation (S O2 ). Results We validated that our system could detect delayed cerebrovascular recovery from hypoxia in an orthotopic xenograft glioma model under anesthetized condition and we also found increased CBVF and impaired vascular reactivity during hypercapnia in a freely-moving mouse model of AD compared to wild-type littermates. Conclusions Our optomechanical approach to reproducibly getting light into and out of the brain enabled us to successfully measure CBVF and S O2 during hypercapnia in unanesthetized freely-moving mice. We present hardware and software enabling oximetric analysis of metabolic activity, which provides a safe and reliable method for rapid assessment of vascular reactivity in murine disease models as well as CBVF and S O2 .

Fiberoptic Hemodynamic Spectroscopy: validation in glioma model and magnetic probe to study cerebrovascular dysregulation in freely-moving Alzheimer’s disease model mice