Scrambler, Fidget, Stargazer, and other mouse strains that mimic human neurological diseases, may have to move over. They are about to get plenty of company in their home in Bar Harbor, Maine. The Jackson Laboratory is planning to use its largest grant ever--$16.3 million from the National Institutes of Health--to develop and support more strains of mimicking mice. With a new building under construction, Jackson is expected to increase by 16 percent the number of mice it can maintain. At present it distributes more than 1.7 million research mice to 12,000 research laboratories in 56 countries, as models for various human conditions.
Jackson Laboratory, however, is not concentrating on neurodegenerative diseases alone. Other areas of particular interest are cancer, heart, lung and blood diseases, eye disease, hearing loss, neuromuscular disease, obesity, AIDS, environmental toxins, skin and hair diseases, gallstones, Downs syndrome, lysosomal storage diseases, diabetes, and immunologic diseases, including autoiummne ...
