We and others have recently successfully used both normal and metabolic syndrome rat models of transient, repetitive left anterior descending coronary artery occlusion to study coronary collateral development. A pneumatic occluder is secured onto the surface of the heart with the suture, which is also passed under the LAD so that when the balloon is inflated, the LAD is occluded. The occluder has a catheter, which is externalized for easy access for manual inflation, using an air-filled syringe, post-surgically. This method, although effective, presents complications in terms of reproducibility and practicality. Most significantly, manual inflation allows for regulation of the volume of air injected into the occluder but provides no indication of consistent pressure from animal to animal. Since occluders are manufactured individually and manually, some variation in their size is inevitable. Therefore, despite identical volumes being injected, the varying inflation pressure and consequent varying extent of LAD occlusion introduces a small, yet unnecessary confounding variable into the Indatraline hydrochloride experimental design. Secondly, it can be difficult to maintain a stringent schedule demanded by manual occlusion inflation protocols for periods of several weeks or months, especially in smaller laboratories. Because the timing and duration of transient coronary occlusions has been associated with the extent of collateral growth, these small variations in LAD occlusion or frequency may also effect variations in the extent of collateral growth. To overcome these obstacles, we have developed an SDZ 220-040 automated inflation system. This system allows reproducible pressurized inflation of up to four pneumatic occluders simultaneously. In addition, complex and varied experimental protocols can be defined including inflation times, repetition rates, resting times, and the number of cycles for each occlusion protocol. This system has significantly increased the reproducibility of coronary collateral growth studies in our laboratory, resulting in a significant decrease in the numbers of animals needed to complete each study while relieving laboratory personnel from the burden of extra working hours and enabling us to continue studies over periods when we previously could not. In this paper, we describe the construction and operation of a device for automated inflation of pneumatic occluders in transient LAD ischemia studies.