Morris Water Maze (MWM): Principles & Protocol
The Morris Water Maze (MWM) is a classic assay of spatial learning and memory in rodents. Established by Richard Morris in 1981, its core design places a hidden escape platform in a circular pool. How animals find and climb onto the platform reflects spatial cognition and memory.
MWM is widely used to study hippocampal spatial learning mechanisms, memory deficits in Alzheimer’s and other cognitive models, entorhinal and related circuits, aging or brain injury effects on cognition, and cognitive-enhancing drug discovery and efficacy evaluation.
Lite Maze Tracking delivers research-grade MWM readouts—latency, target-quadrant path and time, swim speed, first arrival, start-to-platform straight-line distance, and platform crossings—with professional accuracy for spatial learning studies.
Hand intrusion into the pool can be misread as animal entry in conventional software, biasing latency. An interactive timeline lets you set the true water-entry frame so latency stays accurate.
Define any ROI—target quadrant, a platform-centered circle (pool radius or smaller)—and quantify dwell time and path length for circling or search strategies beyond simple latency.
| Parameter | Description | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| sample_name | Sample name | — |
| group_label | Group label | — |
| total_distance | Total distance | cm |
| average_speed | Average speed | cm/s |
| xxx_distance | Distance in a region | cm |
| xxx_distance_ratio | Region distance ratio | % |
| xxx_average_speed | Average speed in a region | cm/s |
| xxx_time | Time in a region | s |
| xxx_time_ratio | Region time ratio | % |
| xxx_number_of_entries | Entries into a region | count |
| outside_distance | Distance outside regions | cm |
| outside_distance_ratio | Outside distance ratio | % |
| outside_time | Time outside regions | s |
| outside_time_ratio | Outside time ratio | % |
| Parameter | Description | Meaning | Unit |
|---|---|---|---|
| latency_to_first | Latency to first platform arrival | Time from water entry to first finding the platform | s |
| swim_distance | Swim distance to platform | Path length from water entry to first platform arrival | cm |
| water_to_latency_distance | Straight-line start-to-platform distance | Euclidean distance from release point to first platform contact | cm |
| swim_speed | Mean swim speed to platform | Average speed from water entry to first platform arrival | cm/s |
| platform_crossing_number | Platform crossings | Number of times the animal crosses the platform location after water entry | count |