Transparent Plexiglas cylinders for forced swim test protocols, measuring antidepressant-like behaviors through immobility time quantification in rodents.
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Scientist guidance
Louise Corscadden, PhD
Director of Science · ConductScience
Ask Louise about Forced Swim Test fit, setup, configuration, or quote prep.
...for 15 minutes (pretest) and 5 minutes (test) in a cylinder with 30-cm diameter and 60-cm height (MazeEngineers, Skokie, IL, USA) filled with 30 cm tap water at a temperature of 24°C ± 1°C.
Maze Engineers, the maker named in the paper, is part of ConductScience.
As of , this is the only study we’ve found that used this product.
The Forced Swim Test apparatus consists of transparent Plexiglas cylinders designed for behavioral assessment of antidepressant-like effects in rodents. Water-filled chambers prevent floor contact and wall climbing, creating a controlled environment where animals exhibit measurable behavioral responses. The test induces learned helplessness by placing subjects in an inescapable aquatic environment, allowing researchers to quantify immobility time as a primary outcome measure.
Available in three configurations to accommodate different species and body weights, the apparatus features odor-resistant acrylic construction for consistent experimental conditions across sessions. The standardized design supports reproducible protocols for antidepressant screening and behavioral despair studies. Assembly is required, with storage solutions included for laboratory space management.
How It Works
The forced swim test operates on the principle of behavioral despair, where animals placed in an inescapable water-filled cylinder initially attempt active escape behaviors (swimming, climbing) before transitioning to passive floating or minimal movements. The water level is calibrated to prevent foot contact with the chamber bottom while the smooth walls prevent climbing escape, creating a standardized stressful environment.
Behavioral scoring focuses on immobility time, defined as minimal movements necessary only to keep the head above water. Active behaviors include swimming (horizontal movements) and climbing (vertical movements directed at walls). The transparent Plexiglas construction allows clear visualization for manual scoring or video analysis systems. Test duration typically ranges from 5-15 minutes, with immobility measurements serving as the primary dependent variable for statistical analysis.
Features & Benefits
Transparent Plexiglas construction
Provides clear visibility for accurate behavioral observation and video analysis without visual obstruction
Species-specific sizing options
Optimized chamber dimensions (20cm, 25cm, 30cm diameter) accommodate different rodent species and body weights effectively
Odor-resistant acrylic material
Maintains consistent experimental conditions by preventing odor accumulation that could influence animal behavior
Water escape prevention design
Controlled water depth and smooth walls create standardized inescapable environment for reliable behavioral assessment
Assembly required configuration
Allows compact shipping and storage while ensuring proper chamber construction for experimental needs
Included storage solutions
Facilitates laboratory space management and equipment organization between experimental sessions
One-year warranty coverage
Provides equipment reliability assurance and technical support for sustained research operations
Add-ons and modifications
Add-on
Price
Details
Drain
$150
Additional
Add any of these to your quote request.
Research identifiers
These IDs come from the Measurement Method Ontology (MMO) and NCBI Taxonomy. Use them in data records and methods sections.
Transparent Plexiglas with odor-resistant properties
Basic plastic or glass chambers without odor control
Maintains consistent experimental conditions by preventing odor accumulation between test sessions
Size Options
Three diameter configurations (20cm, 25cm, 30cm)
Single-size chambers requiring adaptation for different species
Optimized chamber dimensions ensure appropriate testing conditions across mouse and rat studies
Warranty Coverage
One-year manufacturer warranty
Limited or no warranty coverage
Provides equipment reliability assurance and ongoing technical support for sustained research programs
Storage Integration
Included storage solutions
No storage components provided
Facilitates laboratory space management and equipment organization between experimental sessions
The apparatus combines species-specific sizing options with odor-resistant construction and integrated storage solutions. The transparent Plexiglas design supports both manual observation and video analysis protocols with one-year warranty coverage.
Model
SKU
Listed price
Status
Shipping box
Large Rat
ME-3703
$1,490.00
Available
43.2 × 38.0 × 60 cm
Mouse
ME-3701
$890.00
Available
30.48 × 30.48 × 55.88 cm
Rat
ME-3702
$1,190.00
Available
43.2 × 38.0 × 45 cm
Behavioral Pharmacology
Screening potential antidepressant compounds by measuring immobility duration in water-filled chambers to assess behavioral despair responses.
Anxiety and Depression
Evaluating depressive-like phenotypes in transgenic mouse models through standardized swimming behavior analysis protocols.
Neuroscience
Investigating stress-coping strategies and learned helplessness mechanisms in controlled aquatic behavioral paradigms.
Neurodegeneration
Assessing mood-related behavioral changes in animal models of neurodegenerative diseases using established despair testing protocols.
Addiction Research
Examining withdrawal-induced depressive behaviors in substance dependence models through immobility scoring methodologies.
Aging Research
Characterizing age-related changes in stress responsivity and behavioral adaptation using standardized swimming test protocols.
Practical Tips
Best Practices
Maintain water temperature at 23-25°C throughout testing sessions using a thermometer to monitor consistency.
Why: Temperature variations can influence animal activity levels and confound behavioral measurements.
Maintenance
Clean chambers thoroughly with appropriate disinfectant and allow complete drying between subjects.
Why: Residual odors can influence subsequent animal behavior and compromise experimental validity.
Data Quality
Establish clear behavioral scoring criteria and train observers to achieve consistent inter-rater reliability above 90%.
Why: Subjective behavioral scoring requires standardization to ensure reproducible and reliable data collection.
Safety
Have towels and warming equipment readily available for immediate animal care post-testing.
Why: Rapid drying and warming prevent hypothermia and ensure animal welfare following water exposure.
Troubleshooting
If animals consistently show excessive climbing behavior, verify water depth meets protocol specifications.
Why: Insufficient water depth allows floor contact, enabling escape behaviors that compromise test validity.
Calibration
Verify chamber dimensions and water depth before each experimental series using standardized measuring tools.
Why: Consistent physical parameters ensure reproducible testing conditions across experimental sessions and studies.
Setup Guide
Unpack and Inspect
Remove Plexiglas cylinder components and verify all parts are present according to the included assembly guide.
Assemble Chamber
Construct the cylinder following manufacturer specifications, ensuring all seams are properly secured to prevent water leakage.
Position and Level
Place assembled chamber on stable, level surface in a quiet testing room with consistent ambient temperature and lighting.
Fill with Water
Add water to specified depth (typically 15-20 cm) at 23-25°C, ensuring animals cannot touch bottom or climb walls.
Calibrate Recording
Set up video recording system or position for direct observation, ensuring clear visibility of entire cylinder interior.
Pre-exposure Protocol
Conduct habituation session 24 hours prior to testing if required by experimental protocol.
Execute Test Session
Place animal in cylinder and begin timing, recording behavioral measures according to established scoring criteria.
What’s in the Box
Plexiglas cylinder components (typical)
Assembly hardware and instructions (typical)
Storage system components
User manual with protocol guidelines (typical)
Warranty
ConductScience provides a one-year manufacturer warranty covering material defects and construction quality, with technical support for setup and protocol optimization.
Compliance
IACUC Protocol GuidelinesCommonly used in behavioral studies subject to institutional animal care and use committee oversight for stress-inducing procedures
NIH Guide for Care and Use of Laboratory AnimalsSupports behavioral assessment protocols conducted under federal guidelines for laboratory animal research standards
References
Background reading relevant to this product:
1.David A. Slattery et al. (2012) “Using the rat forced swim test to assess antidepressant-like activity in rodents” Nature Protocolsdoi:10.1038/nprot.2012.044
2.Vincent Castagné et al. (2011) “Rodent Models of Depression: Forced Swim and Tail Suspension Behavioral Despair Tests in Rats and Mice” Current Protocols in Neurosciencedoi:10.1002/0471142301.ns0810as55
3.Roni Yankelevitch-Yahav et al. (2015) “The Forced Swim Test as a Model of Depressive-like Behavior” Journal of Visualized Experimentsdoi:10.3791/52587
4.Adem Can et al. (2011) “The Mouse Forced Swim Test” Journal of Visualized Experimentsdoi:10.3791/3638
5.Olena V. Bogdanova et al. (2013) “Factors influencing behavior in the forced swim test” Physiology & Behaviordoi:10.1016/j.physbeh.2013.05.012
The Forced Swim Test (Porsolt test) is a behavioral assay used to assess depression-like behavior in rodents by measuring the duration of immobility when placed in an inescapable cylinder of water.
Q
How does the Forced Swim Test work?
A
A rodent is placed in a cylinder filled with water from which it cannot escape. After initial vigorous swimming, the animal adopts an immobile posture. Immobility time is measured as an index of behavioral despair, which is reduced by antidepressant treatments.
Q
What research applications use the Forced Swim Test?
A
The Forced Swim Test is one of the most widely used screens for antidepressant drug efficacy. It is also applied in stress resilience research and studies of monoaminergic and glutamatergic system function.
Have a question about this product?
Each paper below used this product. Under each title is the paper’s own sentence naming the equipment it used.
Szabolcs Koncz, Noémi Papp, Dóra Pothorszki et al. · International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2023
From the methods
...for 15 minutes (pretest) and 5 minutes (test) in a cylinder with 30-cm diameter and 60-cm height (MazeEngineers, Skokie, IL, USA) filled with 30 cm tap water at a temperature of 24°C ± 1°C.
The same license also scores standard tests such as the open field, the elevated plus maze, the Y-maze and the Morris water maze. Results export as CSV files.
RDRoger D. PorsoltCo-developed the forced swim (Porsolt) test (1977)Synthélabo Research, France
About the Creator
Roger D. Porsolt is a French pharmacologist who, at Synthélabo Research in France, co-developed the forced swim test with Michel Le Pichon and Maurice Jalfre, introducing it in a 1977 Nature paper. The test places a rodent in an inescapable water cylinder and scores immobility as a behavioral index of despair, exploiting the finding that antidepressant-treated animals sustain escape behavior longer than controls. Its speed, simplicity and consistent response to antidepressants made it the dominant preclinical screen for antidepressant activity. Porsolt later founded a contract research organization specializing in preclinical behavioral pharmacology.
To view Roger D. Porsolt’s publications, visit PubMed.
Are you Roger D. Porsolt? to review your photo and bio, and find out how to submit Creator Insights.
ConductScience celebrates method creators: researchers who, through rigorous and often ingenious experiments, develop the tools that reveal how the brain and body work. These are real scientific discoveries that become everyday instruments for the labs that follow.
Foundational paper
Porsolt, R. D., Le Pichon, M., & Jalfre, M. (1977). Depression: a new animal model sensitive to antidepressant treatments. Nature, 266(5604), 730–732. doi:10.1038/266730a0
The Forced Swim Test is a behavioral immobility and stress-coping assay that records how a rodent shifts between active escape behavior and passive immobility when placed in an inescapable water cylinder. Porsolt and colleagues introduced the procedure, and it is historically used to screen for antidepressant-like activity in rodents as research context. 1
The primary readout is immobility time, scored as the period in which the animal makes only the movements needed to keep its head above water. Latency to immobility, climbing time, and swimming time separate the onset and the balance of passive versus active coping across the test session. 1
Water temperature, water depth, pretest and test duration, strain baseline activity, and the immobility-detection threshold all change scored immobility independent of any underlying coping difference. A defensible protocol fixes the water conditions, the session timing, and the scoring threshold, and reports strain so results are comparable across runs. 1
§ 2
Methods
2.1 Procedure
Inescapable-cylinder swim session with immobility, climbing, and swimming scored against a fixed mobility threshold.
Pre-test setup
1.Acclimation and handling: Habituate animals to the room and to handling so the first session reflects coping behavior rather than novelty or handling stress.
2.Set water conditions: Fix water temperature and depth before any data are collected, because cooler or shallower water changes immobility independent of coping.
3.Define session timing: Fix whether a pretest session is used and set the pretest and test durations and the scoring window in advance.
4.Set the immobility threshold: Define the mobility threshold that separates immobility from active movement, since labs draw this line differently and it shifts the scored immobility.
Trial sequence
1.Place animal in cylinder: Lower the animal gently into the cylinder facing away from the observer and start the front-view recording and timer.1
2.Score immobility: Mark immobility when the animal makes only the movements required to keep its head above water, using the pre-defined threshold.4
3.Score active coping: Separate climbing (vigorous forepaw movement against the wall) from swimming (horizontal movement across the cylinder) as distinct active-coping categories.4
4.Record latency: Log latency to the first bout of sustained immobility alongside total immobility time.
5.Recover and clean: Remove the animal, dry and warm it before returning it to the home cage, and refresh the water between subjects to remove odor cues.
Critical methodological constraints
Water temperature. Cooler water raises immobility and adds a thermal stressor that is not coping behavior. Fix temperature and report it.2
Water depth. Shallow water lets the animal touch or brace against the bottom, deflating immobility. Standardize depth so the cylinder stays inescapable.3
Session timing. Pretest and test durations and the scoring window must be held constant, because immobility accumulates over time and is not comparable across different timings.5
Immobility threshold. The line between immobility and active movement is a scoring decision. Pre-specify the mobility threshold and apply it consistently across groups.4
2.2 Measurement & Analysis
Core forced-swim endpoints for passive versus active coping and quality control.
Immobility Time
Passive coping
Total time the animal makes only the movements needed to keep its head above water, the primary passive-coping readout.1
Latency To Immobility
Coping onset
Time from placement to the first sustained bout of immobility, indexing how quickly the animal shifts toward passive coping.
Climbing Time
Active coping
Time spent in vigorous forepaw movement against the cylinder wall, scored separately from swimming as an active-coping category.4
Swimming Time
Active coping
Time spent in horizontal movement across the cylinder, the second active-coping category distinguished from climbing.4
Mobility Tracking
Quality control
Continuous mobility trace against the scoring threshold, used to confirm the immobility threshold was applied consistently across subjects.
+ Additional metrics: water temperature, water depth, pretest use, session duration, strain, body weight, and per-cylinder video notes.
2.3 immobility fraction (analysis)
A compact fraction of the scored window the animal spent immobile rather than actively coping.
Formula: immobility time / (immobility time + mobility time) x 100. Interpret with water temperature and depth, session timing, strain baseline activity, and the mobility threshold because the same fraction can reflect different scoring choices. 1
2.4 sample-size planning
Estimate the N per group needed to detect a literature-anchored coping effect at the endpoint you plan to report. Override the defaults with your own pilot numbers.
Control vs stressed mouse in a standard cylinder; representative magnitudes from Can et al. (2012) mouse forced swim methods.2
Formula: n = 2 · ((zα/2 + zβ) / d)2, where d = |μ₁ − μ₂| / σ. Assumes equal allocation, normality, and homoskedasticity. The attrition cushion inflates total N by 1 / (1 − dropout); confirm with your IACUC.
§ 3
Results
3.1 Sample apparatus output
Representative output from a 6-minute test session scored from front-view video against a fixed mobility threshold.
Table 1 · Per-animal Forced Swim Test scoring output
Animal
Group
Immobility
Latency
Climbing
Immobility fraction
FST-001
Control
118 s
92 s
74 s
39.3%
FST-002
Control
126 s
88 s
68 s
42.0%
FST-003
Control
110 s
96 s
79 s
36.7%
FST-004
Stressed
184 s
48 s
38 s
61.3%
FST-005
Stressed
196 s
44 s
34 s
65.3%
FST-006
Stressed
178 s
52 s
41 s
59.3%
Synthetic example for illustration only. Pair immobility with water temperature, session timing, and the mobility threshold before interpreting coping differences.
§ 4
Discussion
Limitations of the paradigm, methodological caveats, and current directions.
4.1 Common confounds
Variables that can shift Forced Swim Test results apart from the effect under study.
Water temperature
Cooler water raises immobility and introduces a thermal stressor unrelated to coping. Fix and report temperature.
Water depth
Shallow water lets animals touch or brace against the bottom, deflating immobility.
Pretest & test duration
Immobility accumulates over time, so different pretest and test durations are not comparable. Hold session timing constant.
Strain baseline activity
Strains differ in baseline swimming and immobility. Compare within strain and report it rather than pooling across strains.
Immobility-detection threshold
The line between immobility and active movement is observer- or software-set. A fixed threshold and ideally a blinded scorer reduce variance.
Confound checklist
Tick the confounds your protocol addresses, then export a methods-paragraph blurb you can paste into your manuscript.
Preview exported markdown
4.2 Construct validity caveats
The forced swim test is a research methods model of passive versus active coping in rodents; it is not a clinical measure and clinical interpretation is out of scope. It is strongest when water conditions, session timing, and the mobility threshold are fixed before testing, with climbing and swimming scored separately and confirmed against an independent behavioral assay. 1
4.3 Special considerations
Should I score climbing and swimming separately?
Yes. The modified scoring separates climbing from swimming as distinct active-coping categories, which is more informative than a single mobility count and helps localize where a behavioral shift occurs.
Do I need a pretest session?
Rat protocols often use a pretest day followed by a test day, while many mouse protocols use a single session. Decide in advance, hold it constant across groups, and report which design you used.
How do I keep water conditions from confounding results?
Fix water temperature and depth, refresh water between subjects, and report both. Cooler or shallower water changes immobility independent of any coping difference.
4.4 Current directions
Quarterly editorial review of emerging Forced Swim Test methodology. Q2 2026
Methods
Mobility-threshold standardization
Calibrating the software mobility threshold across rigs improves comparability of immobility time between labs and scoring systems.
Emerging
Automated coping classification
Video-based classifiers that separate immobility, climbing, and swimming reduce observer burden and improve consistency of active-coping categories.
Methods
Water-condition reporting
Reporting water temperature, depth, and session timing is increasingly expected because each shifts scored immobility independent of coping.
Emerging
Multi-assay behavioral batteries
The forced swim test is paired with open-field and elevated-plus-maze measures to separate coping behavior from general locomotion and exploratory activity.
§ 5
Background references
6 selected methods and validation studies of the Forced Swim Test, from any lab.
Porsolt RD, Le Pichon M, Jalfre M. Depression: a new animal model sensitive to antidepressant treatments. Nature. 1977;266(5604):730-732.doi:10.1038/266730a0
Can A, Dao DT, Arad M, Terrillion CE, Piantadosi SC, Gould TD. The mouse forced swim test. J Vis Exp. 2012;(59):e3638.doi:10.3791/3638
Slattery DA, Cryan JF. Using the rat forced swimming test to assess antidepressant-like activity in rodents. Nat Protoc. 2012;7(6):1009-1014.doi:10.1038/nprot.2012.044
Cryan JF, Valentino RJ, Lucki I. Assessing substrates underlying the behavioural effects of antidepressants using the modified rat forced swimming test. Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2005;29(4-5):547-569.doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2005.03.008
Petit-Demouliere B, Chenu F, Bourin M. Forced swimming test in mice: a review of antidepressant activity. Psychopharmacology. 2005;177(3):245-255.doi:10.1007/s00213-004-2048-7
Yankelevitch-Yahav R, Franko M, Huly A, Doron R. The forced swim test as a model of depressive-like behavior. J Vis Exp. 2015;(97):52587.doi:10.3791/52587
