The grimace scale: a useful tool for assessing pain in laboratory animals
Exp Anim. 2024 Feb 22. doi: 10.1538/expanim.24-0010. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTAccurately and promptly assessing pain in experimental animals is extremely important to avoid unnecessary suffering of the animals and to enhance the reproducibility of experiments. This is a key concern for veterinarians, animal caretakers, and researchers from the perspectives of veterinary care and animal welfare. Various methods including ethology, immunohistochemistry, electrophysiology, and molecular biology are used for pain assessment. However, the grimace scale, which was developed by taking cues from interpreting pain through faci...
Source: Experimental Animals - February 21, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Kenta Onuma Masaki Watanabe Nobuya Sasaki Source Type: research
Time-dependent changes in retinoids content in liver and adipose tissue after feeding of a vitamin A-deficient diet to mice
This study aimed to assess the retinoids levels in liver and white adipose tissue in mice fed a vitamin A-deficient diet for £8 weeks. High-performance liquid chromatography was used to measure the retinoids levels in liver and white adipose tissue every 2 weeks for £8 weeks. Vitamin A-deficient diet feeding significantly decreased retinol in the liver over 6 weeks, but retinyl palmitate, a main storage form of vitamin A, was not changed over 8 weeks. The plasma retinol level remained constant throughout the experiment. In white adipose tissue, retinyl palmitate gradually decreased over 8 weeks. These results indicate th...
Source: Experimental Animals - February 21, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Mira Kato-Suzuki Yuko Okamatsu-Ogura Osamu Inanami Kazuhiro Kimura Source Type: research
The grimace scale: a useful tool for assessing pain in laboratory animals
Exp Anim. 2024 Feb 22. doi: 10.1538/expanim.24-0010. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTAccurately and promptly assessing pain in experimental animals is extremely important to avoid unnecessary suffering of the animals and to enhance the reproducibility of experiments. This is a key concern for veterinarians, animal caretakers, and researchers from the perspectives of veterinary care and animal welfare. Various methods including ethology, immunohistochemistry, electrophysiology, and molecular biology are used for pain assessment. However, the grimace scale, which was developed by taking cues from interpreting pain through faci...
Source: Experimental Animals - February 21, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Kenta Onuma Masaki Watanabe Nobuya Sasaki Source Type: research
Time-dependent changes in retinoids content in liver and adipose tissue after feeding of a vitamin A-deficient diet to mice
This study aimed to assess the retinoids levels in liver and white adipose tissue in mice fed a vitamin A-deficient diet for £8 weeks. High-performance liquid chromatography was used to measure the retinoids levels in liver and white adipose tissue every 2 weeks for £8 weeks. Vitamin A-deficient diet feeding significantly decreased retinol in the liver over 6 weeks, but retinyl palmitate, a main storage form of vitamin A, was not changed over 8 weeks. The plasma retinol level remained constant throughout the experiment. In white adipose tissue, retinyl palmitate gradually decreased over 8 weeks. These results indicate th...
Source: Experimental Animals - February 21, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Mira Kato-Suzuki Yuko Okamatsu-Ogura Osamu Inanami Kazuhiro Kimura Source Type: research
Progranulin deficiency attenuates tubulointerstitial injury in a mouse unilateral ureteral obstruction model
Exp Anim. 2024 Feb 16. doi: 10.1538/expanim.23-0080. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTProgranulin (PGRN) may have two opposing effects-inflammation and anti-inflammation-in different diseases. Although previous studies have reported that PGRN is involved in liver fibrosis, its involvement in tubulointerstitial fibrosis remains to be fully elucidated. Herein, we investigated these issues using PGRN-knockout (KO) mice treated with unilateral ureteral obstruction (UUO). Eight-week-old male PGRN-KO and wild-type (WT) mice were euthanized 3 and 7 days following UUO, and their kidneys were harvested for histopathological analysis. ...
Source: Experimental Animals - February 18, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Eri Adachi Maki Murakoshi Terumi Shibata Kenta Shimozawa Hiroko Sakuma Chiaki Kishida Tomohito Gohda Yusuke Suzuki Source Type: research
Deletion of Exoc7, but not Exoc3, in male germ cells causes severe spermatogenesis failure with spermatocyte aggregation in mice
In this study, we found that exocyst factor EXOC3 (SEC6) was not required for spermatogenesis, but depletion of EXOC7 (EXO70) led to severe spermatogenesis defects. In addition to being a component of the exocyst complex, EXOC1 has other functions. Notably, male germ cell-specific Exoc7 cKO and Exoc1 cKO mice exhibited phenotypic similarities, suggesting the importance of the exocyst complex for spermatogenesis. The results of this study will contribute to further understanding of spermatogenesis from the aspect of vesicular trafficking.PMID:38325858 | DOI:10.1538/expanim.23-0171 (Source: Experimental Animals)
Source: Experimental Animals - February 7, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Natsuki Mikami Chi Lieu Kim Nguyen Yuki Osawa Kanako Kato Miyuki Ishida Yoko Tanimoto Kento Morimoto Kazuya Murata Woojin Kang Funihiro Sugiyama Masatsugu Ema Satoru Takahasi Seiya Mizuno Source Type: research
Systemic autoimmune abnormalities alter the morphology of mucosa-associated lymphoid tissues in the rectum of MRL/MpJ-Fas < sup > lpr/lpr < /sup > mice
Exp Anim. 2024 Feb 2. doi: 10.1538/expanim.23-0129. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTSystemic autoimmune diseases (ADs) might affect the morphology and function of gut-associated lymphoid tissue (LTs) indirectly; however, their exact relationship remains unclear. Therefore, we investigated mouse LTs in the anorectal canal and morphologically compared them between MRL/MpJ-Fas+/+ and MRL/MpJ-Faslpr/lpr mice. LT aggregations, also known as rectal mucosa-associated lymphoid tissues (RMALTs), were exclusively seen in the lamina propria and submucosa of the rectum. The mean size and number of the LT aggregations both significantly ...
Source: Experimental Animals - February 4, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Md Zahir Uddin Rubel Osamu Ichii Takashi Namba Md Abdul Masum Tsolmon Chuluunbaatar Masaya Hiraishi Teppei Nakamura Yasuhiro Kon Source Type: research
Neuroprotective effect of gallic acid in mice with rotenone-induced neurodegeneration
In conclusion, gallic acid ameliorated motor deficits and preserving SNc neurons which led to maintaining of the dopaminergic source, including a nurturing effect on supporting astrocytes in mice with rotenone-induced neurodegeneration.PMID:38296489 | DOI:10.1538/expanim.23-0165 (Source: Experimental Animals)
Source: Experimental Animals - January 31, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Wachiryah Thong-Asa Chatrung Wassana Kunyarat Sukkasem Pichcha Innoi Montira Dechakul Pattraporn Timda Source Type: research
Validation of the anesthetic effect of a mixture of remimazolam, medetomidine, and butorphanol in three mouse strains
This study replaced midazolam in the MMB combination with remimazolam (RMZ), which is noted for its ultra-short half-life. The resulting combination, called MRB, was effective inproviding a wider safety margin compared to MAB while maintaining an anesthesia depth equivalent level to that of MMB in mice. Notably, MRB consistently exhibited better recovery scores after antagonist administration in contrast to MMB. Furthermore, the re-sedation phenomenon observed with MMB was not observed with MRB. The rapid metabolism of RMZ enables reliable anesthesia induction, circumventing the complications linked to MAB. Overall, MRB ex...
Source: Experimental Animals - January 21, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Masaki Watanabe Yuko Nikaido Nobuya Sasaki Source Type: research
CCR2 antagonist attenuates calcium oxalate-induced kidney oxidative stress and inflammation by regulating macrophage activation
This study aims to evaluate the effects of CCR2 on KS in vivo and in vitro. Eight-week-old male C57BL/6J mice were intraperitoneally injected with glyoxylate (GOX) daily to establish a KS model, and along with CCR2 antagonist (INCB3344) treatment on days 2, 4, and 6. The results showed that CCR2 antagonist reduced renal injury markers (blood urea nitrogen and serum creatinine), alleviated renal tubular injury and CaOx crystal deposition. CCR2 antagonist also decreased CCR2 expression induced by GOX treatment and increased Nrf2 expression. GOX treatment promoted malondialdehyde (MDA) production, decreased glutathione (GSH) ...
Source: Experimental Animals - January 10, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Xinpeng Wang Linguo Xie Chunyu Liu Source Type: research
Establishment and visual analysis of CBA/J-Pde6b < sup > Y347Y/Y347X < /sup > and C3H/HeJ-Pde6b < sup > Y347Y/Y347X < /sup > mice
Exp Anim. 2023 Dec 28. doi: 10.1538/expanim.23-0142. Online ahead of print.ABSTRACTIn CBA/J and C3H/HeJ mice, retinitis pigmentosa is inherited as an autosomal-recessive trait due to a mutation in Pde6b, which encodes cGMP phosphodiesterase subunit b. In these strains, the Y347X mutation in Pde6b leads to the upregulation of cGMP levels, increased Ca2+ influx induces rod death, and the outer segment and rod cells entirely disappeared by 35 days after birth. In the present study, we utilized the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeat (CRISPR)/CRISPR-associated (Cas)9-mediated gene editing to repair the Y34...
Source: Experimental Animals - January 3, 2024 Category: Research Authors: Miyuki Shindo Miho Terao Shuji Takada Minoru Ichinose Emiko Matsuzaka Tadashi Yokoi Noriyuki Azuma Seiya Mizuno Hideki Tsumura Source Type: research
