A contextual fear conditioning paradigm in head-fixed mice exploring virtual reality

Contextual fear conditioning is a classical laboratory task that tests associative memory formation and recall. Techniques such as multi-photon microscopy and holographic stimulation offer tremendous opportunities to understand the neural underpinnings of these memories. However, these techniques generally require animals to be head-fixed. There are few paradigms that test contextual fear conditioning in head-fixed mice, and none where the behavioral outcome following fear conditioning is freezing, the most common measure of fear in freely moving animals. To address this gap, we developed a contextual fear conditioning paradigm in head-fixed mice using virtual reality (VR) environments. We designed an apparatus to deliver tail shocks (unconditioned stimulus, US) while mice navigated a VR environment (conditioned stimulus, CS). The acquisition of contextual fear was tested when the mice were reintroduced to the shock-paired VR environment the following day. We tested three different vari..., , # A contextual fear conditioning paradigm in head-fixed mice exploring virtual reality

Dataset DOI: [10.5061/dryad.m63xsj4f3](10.5061/dryad.m63xsj4f3)

## Description of the data and file structure

Behavior Data: .pkl files contain behavior data across animals and sessions and are sorted by the version of the CFC Paradigm they correspond to (i.e. Paradigm 1, 2 or 3)

Imaging Data:
Folder contains mat files with extracted place cells and corresponding animal behavior sorted by animals. Files are divided by each session. Also consists of a csv file with parameters of extracted place cells.

Scripts used to analyze data can be found in [https://github.com/seethakris/CFCMethodspaper](https://github.com/seethakris/CFCMethodspaper)

### Files and variables

#### File: BehaviorData.zip

Description: NaN indicates missing values. Data columns correspond to:

1. Animal: animal name
2. Behavior : running behavior of animals
3. Lap: frames corresponding to each lap
4. Paradigm: The session from ...,