Fig. 1

r-mTBI induced by ACHI causes acute neurological impairment. Male (A) and female (B) animals were administered an ACHI, followed by a NAP, eight times on PND28. The r-mTBI animals had significantly lower NAP scores across all eight ACHIs that did not increase significantly with each additional ACHI. C The average NAP scores for males and females following TBI did not differ significantly from each other, but were significantly lower than for Sham animals for both sexes. D Prior to each ACHI, animals were assessed for pain and abnormal behavior. Scores of 0–1 reflect no abnormalities up to a maximum score of 12; males and females showed low average pain scores. No animal scored higher than 1.5, indicating there were no significant indicators of pain in these cohorts. E–L The 4 reflexive and sensorimotor tasks were scored on a scale of 0 (fail) to 3 (perfect score). Males (E–H) and females (I–L) showed significant impairments on startle response, limb extension and beam walk. Only males showed impairment on the rotating beam task. Group data are presented as mean ± SEM. Open circles in bar graphs represent individual animal data points