Animal testing and alternatives

Analyzing high-throughput assay data to advance the rapid screening of environmental chemicals for human reproductive toxicity

The paper evaluates yeast and nematode high-throughput assays for identifying reproductive toxic environmental chemicals and finds moderate to strong correlations with mammalian in vivo data.

A Systematic Assessment of Robustness in CNS Safety Pharmacology

This study assesses the robustness of Irwin tests across multiple sites for detecting drug-induced neurological effects in mice, finding reduced variability after protocol harmonization.

In Silico Treatment: a computational framework for animal model selection and drug assessment

In Silico Treatment evaluates animal models for disease relevance by simulating gene expression changes in humans, identifying suitable models and drug effects.

Divergent pattern of development in rats and humans.

The paper compares developmental timelines between rats and humans using a combined database of milestones, finding a logarithmic relationship with an inflection point near birth.

Comparing random and timed mating of mice in the experimental paradigm

This study compares random and timed mating strategies in mice to assess pregnancy efficiency and embryonic staging, finding no significant difference in pregnancy rates but recommending timed mating for accurate staging.

Evaluating Study Design Rigor in Preclinical Cardiovascular Research: A Replication Study

This study evaluates methodological rigor in preclinical cardiovascular research by analyzing the inclusion of study design elements over time and across study types.

Examining Litter Specific Variability in Mice and its Impact on Neurodevelopmental Studies

This study examines litter-specific variability in mice and shows how increasing the number of litters can improve power for detecting developmental changes in brain structure and behavior.

Biostatistics and its impact on hazard characterization using in vitro developmental neurotoxicity assays

The paper examines how statistical decisions affect BMC and hazard classification in developmental neurotoxicity assays using case studies and a data evaluation platform.

The statistical power of three monkeys

The paper presents a statistical framework to evaluate the power of experiments with few animals, showing that using three animals and accepting results from two improves statistical power and reduces risk.

In silico modelling demonstrates that user variability during tumour measurement can affect in vivo therapeutic efficacy outcomes

The paper shows that user variability in tumor measurement affects the detection of therapeutic efficacy in preclinical studies, with automated methods reducing false negatives.

Reliability of Mouse Behavioural Tests of Anxiety: a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis on the Effects of Anxiolytics.

This study evaluates the reliability of mouse behavioural tests for anxiety by analyzing anxiolytic drug effects, finding poor replicability and high bias in most tests.

Ovine fetuses from slaughterhouses: a useful source for neural cell primary cultures

This paper establishes a method to obtain neural cell cultures from ovine fetuses obtained during slaughter, demonstrating the feasibility of using these fetuses as an alternative to traditional animal models.

A Reaction Norm Perspective on Reproducibility

The paper argues that reaction norm approaches can improve reproducibility in animal research by addressing environmental effects on phenotypic variation.

The Contribution of Environmental Enrichment to Phenotypic Variation in Mice and Rats

This paper reviews the impact of environmental enrichment on phenotypic variation in mice and rats, finding no increased variability in enriched environments compared to standard housing.

Embrace heterogeneity to improve reproducibility: A perspective from meta-analysis of variation in preclinical research

This paper argues for embracing heterogeneity in preclinical research to improve reproducibility and generalizability through meta-analysis of phenotypic variability in ischaemic stroke models.

What exactly is ‘N’ in cell culture and animal experiments?

The paper examines how sample size (N) is defined in experiments, finding that only 22% correctly replicate the entity-intervention pair, while 46% pseudoreplicate and 32% provide insufficient information.