Using mice to study disease
A National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences study on single nucleotide polymorphisms could reveal key information about why some people are more susceptible to environmental contaminants than others.
New data from 15 mouse strains used for biomedical research have been trumpeted by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and its partners as a novel tool to tease out the link between genetics and the impacts of environmental contaminants in disease.
A 2-year project to sequence the mouse DNA found 8.3 million single nucleotide polymorphisms (known as SNPs). These basic genetic variations could lead to different levels of susceptibility to varying conditions and diseases in the 15 types of mice studied, which are the common strains used in biomedical research.
The patterns in mice could lead to breakthroughs in understanding human “counterpart” genes and the varying pathways that make people susceptible to disease agents, said David Christiani, a professor at Harvard Medical School and School of Public Health, at a press conference in late October where the data were unveiled. “The data will also be a great resource for pharmaceutical companies that are developing new treatments for disease,” he said in a press release.
