/hubrecht-institute-gets-board23
At the Hubrecht Institute, we conduct animal research for a better understanding of health, development and diseases such as cancer. Despite recent advances in animal-free alternatives, some of our research that forms the basis for the development of new therapies cannot be performed without these animals yet. The Hubrecht acknowledges that this research comes with a responsibility to society, ourselves and most importantly our animals. That is why we value transparency and are happy to participate in BOARD23 and communicate openly about the animal research at our institute.
Improving animal care
The Hubrecht constantly aims to improve the welfare of its laboratory animals. For this reason, a new state-of-the-art animal facility opened its doors at our institute last year. In this facility we can ensure care for our animals in the best possible way. Entrance to the new facility is strongly regulated and only registered and certified users are able to enter the facility through hand recognition. All materials that enter are first thoroughly disinfected in a spray hedge and researchers enter through an air shower. In this way, contamination of the facility with pathogens from outside is prevented, improving the welfare of our animals.
A new feature of the facility is the installation of red lights to mimic the day/night regime of the animals and allow research on our laboratory animals without disturbance of their biological clock.
Mice in our new facility are housed according to current standards. They are housed in groups and monitored every day for their well-being. Cages have precision-controlled airflow, provide shelter, enrichment and ad libitum food throughout the day.
We keep a record of every single mouse in our facility and experiments on these mice are only performed after assessment and approval of research proposals by the animal ethics committee (IvD). This ensures that laboratory animals are only used when no alternative approaches can replace them.
Developing alternatives
Besides the efforts to improve the welfare of our laboratory animals, the institute is constantly striving to develop new alternatives to animal research. The research we perform has been pioneering in the development of organoid technology: the formation of mini organs in a dish in the lab. These mini organs form a platform not only for studies on basic principles of organ function but also form an attractive alternative to test potential drugs against diseases. Efforts in our institute have resulted in protocols to culture organoids that mimic almost every organ of the body, which are being used worldwide.