UCSF's Stephen Lisberger tortures primates

Stephen Lisberger of the University of California, San Francisco. His work is described in details here. In brief his experimentation bolts recording cylinders and a restraining bar to the top of a primate’s head. Wire coils are also implanted near the eye.

The primates are deprived of water to “motivate” them to participate in experimentation that involves visual stimuli.

Water or Tang is used as a reward, when the rhesus monkey performs the experiment while confined in a restraint chair with the monkey’s head literally bolted in place.

This experiment is barbaric in nature. One of the cruelest parts of this experiment is the practice of depriving intelligent primates of water for extended periods of time. UCSF experimental procedures are known to deprive primates of water for as much as 22 consecutive hours, five days per week.

Please contact Steven Lisberger and demand that he immediately end this practice of depriving primates of water. This should never be done in any laboratory anywhere. Don’t take no for an answer. Call him often. Email him regularly. His research is funded with federal grants from the National Institutes of Health. This is your tax money. You have a right to express your opinion to him.

Steven Lisberger
Box 0444 , Central Campus, HSE-812
University of California, San Francisco
San Francisco, CA 94143–0444
sgl [at] phy.ucsf.edu
(415) 476-1062

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These quotations from a publication of Stephen Lisberger’s accurately describe his experimentation on rhesus monkeys. In most instances, when water or another form of liquid is used as a reward for a primate, this follows a period of water deprivation. UCSF, the facility in which Lisberger performs his experimentation, is known to deprive primates of water for as much as 22 consecutive hours.

J Neurophysiol 94: 2416-2426, 2005. First published June 8, 2005

Relationship Between Extraretinal Component of Firing Rate and Eye Speed in Area MST of Macaque Monkeys
Anne K. Churchland2,3,4 and Stephen G. Lisberger1,2,3,4

1Howard Hughes Medical Institute, 2Department of Physiology, 3Neuroscience Graduate Program, 4W. M. Keck Foundation Center for Integrative Neuroscience, University of California, San Francisco, California

Methods

Eye movement and neural recordings were obtained from two adult male rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta) that had been trained to fixate and pursue visual targets for fluid reward. Monkeys were implanted with a stainless steel socket for head restraint and a scleral search coil for measuring eye position, using methods described in detail elsewhere (Churchland and Lisberger 2000 ). After initial training, monkeys were implanted with stainless steel or cilux cylinders (Crist Instruments, Hagerstown, MD) to allow access to MST for neural recordings. Surgeries were conducted using sterile technique with the monkeys under isofluorane anesthesia, and analgesics were given under the supervision of veterinarians and veterinary nurses during the recovery after each surgical procedure. For each experimental session, the monkey sat in a primate chair and the implanted socket was used to affix the head to the ceiling of the chair. A tube was positioned at the monkey's mouth for dispensing fluid rewards.