Includes refinements to animal models of aging, asthma, cancer, colitis, diabetes, epilepsy, polyarthritis, etc.
Myxoma virus is a member of Leporipoxviridae whose tropism is tightly restricted to lagomorphs. In susceptible Oryctolagus rabbits, the virus causes a highly lethal disease known as myxomatosis, which begins as a localized infection but...
Spaceflight results in bone loss like that associated with osteoporosis or decreased weight-bearing (for example, high-energy trauma such as explosive injuries and automobile accidents). Thus, the unique spaceflight laboratory on the International Space Station presents...
Guinea pigs are a commonly used model for tuberculosis vaccine research. Loss of body weight is the most frequently described humane endpoint for animals used in these studies. During a chronic study, we noted labored...
Cecal ligation and perforation (CLP) is a common technique for studying sepsis in mice. Because of the invasiveness of the procedure and its effects on clinical condition, many animal care and use committees require the...
The ferret model has long been the “gold standard” animal model for studying human influenza infection and is used all around the world for transmission studies. Professor Wendy Barclay and her team have used ferrets...
Literature is replete with studies on stressors to laboratory rodents; knowing the impact research and husbandry interventions, such as routine cage changing, have on rodents’ stress levels, physiology and behaviour, we hypothesised that animals recovering...
Surgical implantation of tumour pieces has been used regularly in the passage of tumour models. This involves an invasive surgical procedure, carried out under anaesthesia; ensuring mice have adequate pain relief and peri-operative care. The...
Calvarial bone surgery on rabbits is frequently performed. This report aims to document a simple and practical anaesthetic and perioperative management for this procedure. Fourteen male New Zealand white rabbits were included in the study...
What is the central question of this study? There is an ethical imperative to optimize analgesia protocols for laboratory animals, but this is impeded by our inability to recognize pain reliably. We examined whether the...
Animal models of epilepsy and seizures, mostly involving mice and rats, are used to understand the pathophysiology of the different forms of epilepsy and their comorbidities, to identify biomarkers, and to discover new antiepileptic drugs...