Speedy Mouse Eludes Time Trap

Courtesy of Nucleis

Typical litter of potential chimeras derived from BPES cells injected into C57Bl/6 blastocysts. The "host" blastocysts encode black coat color, while the transplanted embryonic stem cells (ESCs) encode agouti. Occasional mice have black coats and are presumed failures at the blastocyst-engraftment stage. But most offspring have some agouti in their coats. Those that are completely agouti, by multiple criteria, appear to be 100% ESC derived.

Instead of waiting months for a transgenic mouse, you can now get to work in weeks, according to Nucleis, based in Lyon, France http://www.nucleis.com. The company says it can produce a characterized founder expressing a gene of choice 36 days after it receives an order. After the mice are weaned, they can be used directly for experiments.

"The technology results in a high number of chimeras with 100% chimerism and 100% germline transmission with guaranteed transgene expression right away," says Carole Fages, ...