Microvascular free flap transfer is an essential procedure in head and neck reconstructive surgery, with total flap loss representing the primary complication. Sepsis has been identified as a critical risk factor contributing to flap failure. Here we aimed to evaluate the impact of septic shock on free flap vitality using a large animal model and further investigated the flap...
The transition away from animal experimentation is gaining momentum across scientific disciplines, driven by technological advancements, ethical imperatives and policy support. At the forefront of this movement is the development of New Approach Methodologies (NAMs). Rather than serving as mere substitutes for animal testing, NAMs represent a paradigm shift. Their growing...
Ketogenic diets (KDs) are widely used in preclinical research to investigate metabolism and neurological function, yet many studies lack methodological consistency and frequently exclude female animals. Here we investigated sex-specific systemic and brain metabolic responses to a standardized KD in mice, highlighting the need to include both sexes. Using the widely used C57BL/6J...
Here we evaluated vancomycin–neomycin or enrofloxacin–ampicillin treatments as alternatives to the poorly tolerated ampicillin–metronidazole–vancomycin–neomycin cocktail for gut bacterial depletion in mice. Both regimens were well tolerated in drinking water and did not reduce food intake or body weight. Metabolic profiling showed reduced bacterial metabolic activity in both...
Zebrafish are a prominent model for investigating behavior and development. However, most behavioral studies have primarily focused on larval and adult stages. The juvenile stage—a critical period of neural and behavioral maturation—has been insufficiently explored, partly because standardized methods for evaluating behavior in different ages are not available. Here we present a...
Demyelinating disorders such as multiple sclerosis and leukodystrophies are on the rise, posing substantial challenges due to their progressive nature and the current limitations of therapies that effectively restore lost myelin. Over the past decade, advancements in regenerative neuroscience, including cutting-edge stem cell therapies, advanced biomaterials and groundbreaking...
Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is a major global health problem, ranking as the sixth most frequently diagnosed cancer and the third leading cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide. Although the incidence of viral infection-mediated HCC has decreased in recent years, the incidence of alcohol- and metabolic dysfunction-associated HCC has increased, driven by changes in...
Mice have been used as models of urinary tract infection (UTI) for decades and laid the basis for the fundamental understanding of UTI pathogenesis in humans. Here we report that the high urine osmolarity of mice impacts key aspects of Escherichia coli UTI pathogenesis and represents a confounder for the translation of results to humans.
Pain and welfare monitoring is essential for ethical animal testing, but current cage-side assessments are qualitative and subjective. Here we present the GrimACE, a fully standardized and automated cage-side monitoring tool for mice, the most widely used animals in research. The GrimACE uses computer vision to provide automated mouse grimace scale (MGS) assessment together with...
The axolotl is a popular model organism in regenerative biology owing to its ability to regenerate amputated limbs and internal organs. The role of injury-derived signals in initiating the regenerative response is still not well understood, but the potential involvement of the stress response is of interest, as injury and stress are temporally linked. The dominant glucocorticoid...
Science faces a reproducibility crisis, and public trust in science declines when large clinical trials, which had been qualified by promising preclinical studies, fail. While some clinical trial designs may have been inadequate, preclinical assessments of disease interventions might have lacked key elements of rigor such as treatment concealment, randomization, blinded outcomes...
Drusen and subretinal drusenoid deposits, the pathognomonic lesions for age-related macular degeneration (AMD), are rich in cholesterol. Yet, AMD is not consistently linked to plasma lipids. Here wild-type and human apolipoprotein B100-expressing (APOB100) mice were put on a Western type of diet for 13 months and then assessed for plasma lipid profile, high-density lipoprotein...