Classic paper
Burešová et al. (1985): the on-demand platform
The idea that led to the rising platform.
Burešová O, Krekule I, Zahálka A, Bureš J (1985). On-demand platform improves accuracy of the Morris water maze procedure. Journal of Neuroscience Methods 15: 63–72.
In plain words: to stop rats finding a hidden platform by chance, the fixed platform was swapped for a collapsible one resting on the pool floor. A video-tracking system raised it only once the rat had stayed in the target area for a set time (from the paper's abstract).
The old watermaze.org hosted a PDF of this paper, and it is back at its original address. Spooner, Thomson and Hall later described the Atlantis platform as "a new design and further developments of Buresova's on-demand platform" (1994). You can read more about how a rising platform works on the Atlantis platform page.
- Read the paper: Buresova_JNM_1985.pdf (PDF, 10 pages, 438 KB), the copy hosted on the original watermaze.org.
- Publisher's record: doi.org/10.1016/0165-0270(85)90062-7
The on-demand idea lives on in the Atlantis platform for the Morris water maze.
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