Another researcher now working for Scripps in Florida is Teresa Reyes.

One of her past research projects was an attempt to determine how monkeys whose mothers experienced stress during pregnancy respond to infection or injury. The bizarrely conceived study involved close to one hundred rhesus monkeys. To study psychological stress, one group of pregnant monkeys was moved from their cages into a dark room, where they were “startled” by 115db horn blasts. This continued for 6 weeks. After the monkeys gave birth, forty-four baby monkeys were then injected with a substance that made them sick, and their recovery was studied.

In a paper published in 2003, Reyes described an experiment in which mice were exposed to extreme physiological (e.g., infection) and emotional stress. To create emotional stress, mice were placed into narrow tubes and left for 30 minutes. The mice were killed shortly after the experiments, and their brains removed.

Predictably, these studies generated only more unanswered questions and a plea for further studies.

In Florida, Reyes is using animals to study appetite and metabolism.