The long-term objective of this project is to enhance an existing research animal care area-into a high quality, small size, animal facility for biomedical research and development (R&D) projects.
The specific aims for the current project are to improve the present animal facility to include new capabilities such as the production of biomedical reagents and in vivo characterization of cell lines. The services and reagents produced at this facility are sought after by the Scientific/Medical community, hence-highly relevant to the mission of the Public Health Service, and other U.S. government agencies. The improvements of the animal facility will include the renovation of the current facility, the purchase and installation of an automatic washer and an autoclave for cleaning and sterilizing animal cages. The new area was designed taking into consideration the animal husbandry required for the potential increase in the number of animals needed for the biological, immunological and feeding experiments for identifying cancer chemopreventive agents. The services of a board certified veterinarian specializing in laboratory animal medicine for the laboratory design, and of sub-contractors with a track record of building animal facilities are expected to complete this project in a timely fashion and within the budgeted amount. On completion of this project, additional experimental capabilities such as xenografting of tumor tissues, in vivo characterization of cell lines cultured in vitro, experiments with transgenic mice, screening for chemopreventive agents, and production of monoclonal antibodies against a number of macromolecules of biomedical interests will be achieved.
