ScienceAsia 9 (1983): 107-118 |doi: 10.2306/scienceasia1513-1874.1983.09.107

AGE ESTIMATION OF RATTUS ARGENTIVENTER FROM EYE LENS WEIGHT

RENU VEJARATPIMOL^a and LIM BOO LIAT^b

ABSTRACT: Attempts were made to correlate eye lens weight and other body measurements of laboratory-bred Rattus argentiventer (rice field rats) with their ages. Eye lenses were fixed in 10% formalin, dried at 120 ^oC and weighed. The rats were sacrificed at varying ages up to 112 days. Transformed age and lens weights were highly correlated (r = 0.9486). Incorporation of the other measurements did not cause marked statistical improvement over the equation derived from using lens weight alone. In the case of live animals, particularly domestic rats, the equation derived from transformed age on total length was considered to be fairly reliable. However, in the case of Ihe field rat, caution should be exercised because the error increases with age as the growth rate decreases.

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a. Biology Department, Faculty of Science, Silpakorn University, Nakhorn Pathom, 73000, Thailand
b. VBC Research Unit, World Health Organization, P.O. Box 302, Jakarta, Indonesia.

Received 1 April 1983